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AND 


THE  BASIS  OF  SOCIAL  RELATIONS 


1 

i 

.The 
Basis  of  Social  Relations 


A  Study  in  Ethnic  Psychology 


By 

Daniel  G.  Brinton,  A.M.,  M.D.,  LL.D.,  Sc.D.  q 

Of  ' 

Late  Professor  of  American  Archeology  and  Linguistics  in  the 

University  of  Pennsylvania  ;  author  of  **  History  of 

Primitive  Religions,"  ** Races  and  Peoples," 

"The  American  Race,"  etc. 


>>JJ»J  '  ■>*    »       t    i       3     f> 


Edited  by 

Livingston  Farrand 

Columbia  University 


G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 
New  York  and  London 

Ebc  IkntcKerbocker  press 

1902 


Copyright,    1902 

BY 

G.   P.   PUTNAM'S  SONS 


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EDITOR'S   PREFACE 

T^HE  manuscript  of  the  following  work  was  left  by 
*  Dr.  Brmton  at  his  death  in  1899  in  a  state  of 
approximate  completion,  lacking  only  final  revision  at 
hisKands.  The  editor  has  contented  himself,  there- 
fore, with  making  such  verbal  corrections  as  were 
necessary  and,  by  slight  rearrangement  of  certain  sec- 
tions to  conform  to  the  obvious  scheme  of  the  work, 
bringing  the  text  into  readiness  for  publication.  The 
verification  and  noting  of  references  have  not  been 
attempted.  The  author's  encyclopedic  acquaintance 
with  the  literature  of  his  subject  as  well  as  his  general 
method  of  quotation  has  made  this  impracticable. 

Dr.  Brinton's  contributions  to  anthropology  are  too 
well  known  to  call  for  especial  comment,  his  writings, 
particularly  in  the  fields  of  American  archaeology  and 
linguistics,  being  so  numerous  and  valuable  as  to  give 
him  a  world-wide  reputation.  His  interest,  however, 
was  general  as  well  as  special,  and  the  development 
of  anthropology  owes  much  to  his  insight  and  ready 
pen.     Among  the  doctrines  for  which  he  stood  at  all 


111 


445395 


iv  EDITORS  PREFACE 

times  an  active  champion  was  the  psychological  unity 
of  man,  a  principle  which  is  now  widely  accepted  and 
forms  the  workinof  basis  for  most  of  our  modern 
ethnology.  Tacitly  assumed,  as  it  is  and  has  been, 
for  the  most  part  since  the  writings  of  Waitz,  the 
need  of  a  succinct  statement  of  the  doctrine  has  long 
been  felt,  and  this  is  now  given,  possibly  in  somewhat 
extreme  form,  in  the  present  work. 

Apart  from  its  intrinsic  interest  the  book  will  be 
welcomed  as  the  last  word  of  the  distinguished  author 
whose  lamented  death  has  deprived  the  science  of 
anthropology  of  one  of  its  ablest  representatives. 

L.   F. 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Introduction  .........       vii 

PART  I 
THE  CULTURAL  HISTORY  OF  THE  ETHNIC  MIND 

CHAPTER  I 
The  Unity  of  the  Human  Mind 3 

CHAPTER  II 
The  Individual  and  the  Group.     The  Ethnic  Mind    .       23 

CHAPTER  III 

Physiological  Variation  in  the  Ethnic  Mind.  Pro- 
gressive AND  Regressive  Variation.  Modes  and 
Rates  of  Ethnic  Variation 46 

CHAPTER  IV 
Pathological  Variation  in  the  Ethnic  Mind      .         .       82 

PART  II 
THE  NATURAL  HISTORY  OF  THE  ETHNIC  MIND 

Introduction  .        .         .         .         .         .         .         .         .123 

CHAPTER  I 
The  Influence  of  the  Somatic  Environment     .         .     126 

V 


vi  CONTENTS 

CIIArTKR  II 

PAGE 

Ethnic    Mental    Diversity    from    Cognatic    Causes. 

Heredity  ;  Hybridity  ;  Racial  Pathology  .         .     147 

CHAPTER  III 

The  Influence  of  the  Social  Environment  .         .         .     163 

CHAPTER  IV 

The  Influence  of  the  Geographic  Environment.         .     180 
Index 201 


INTRODUCTION 

TT  is  strange  that  not  in  any  language  has  there  been 
*  published  a  systematic  treatise  on  Ethnic  Psycho- 
logy ;  strange,  because  the  theme  is  in  no-wise  a  new 
one  but  has  been  the  subject  of  many  papers  and  dis- 
cussions for  a  generation  ;  indeed,  had  a  journal  dedi- 
cated to  its  service  for  a  score  of  years  ;  strange,  also, 
because  its  students  claim  that  it  is  the  key  to  ethno- 
logy, the  sure  interpreter  of  history,  and  the  only 
solid  basis  for  constructive  sociology. 

Why  this  apparent  failure  to  establish  for  itself  a 
position  in  the  temple  of  the  Science  of  Man  ?  This 
inquiry  must  be  answered  on  the  threshold  of  a  treat- 
ise which  undertakes  to  vindicate  for  this  study  an 
independent  position  and  a  permanent  value. 

It  has  been  cultivated__chiefly  by  -German  writers. 
The  periodical  to  which  I  have  referred  was  begun  in 
i860,  under  the  editorship  of  Dr.  M.  Lazarus  and 
Dr.  H.  Steinthal,  the  former  a  psychologist,  the  latter 
a  logician  and  linguist.  The  contributors  to  it  often 
occupied   high  places   in   the   learned  world.     Their 


K 


vu 


viii  IN  TROD  UC  TION 

articles,  usually  on  special  points  In  ethnography  or 
linguistics,  were  replete  with  thought  and  facts.  But 
they  failed  to  convince  their  contemporaries  that 
there  was  any  room  in  the  hierarchy  of  the  sciences 
for  this  newcomer.  The  failure  was  so  palpable  that 
after  twenty  years'  struggle  the  editors  abandoned 
their  task.  But  the  seed  they  sowed  had  not  per- 
ished in  the  soily  Under  other  names  It  struck  root 
and  flourished,  and  Is  now  asserting  for  Itself  a  right 
to  live  by  virtj,ie  of  Its  real  worth  to  the  right  under- 
standing of  human  progress. 

Why,  then,  this  failure  of  its  earlier  cultivation  ? 

To  some  extent,  but  not  in  full,  the  answer  to  this 
may  be  found  in  a  critique  of  the  spirit  and  method 
of  the  writers  mentioned,  offered  by  one  of  the  most 
eminent  psychologists  of  our  generation,  Professor 
W.  Wundt. 

;  With  partial  justice,  he  pointed  out  that  these 
teachers  proceeded  on  a  false  route  In  their  effort 
to  establish  the  principles  of  an  ethnic  psychology. 
They  approached  It  Imbued  with  metaphysical  in- 
genuities, they  indulged  too  much  in  talk  of  "soul," 
and  they  searched  for  ''laws";  whereas,  modern 
psychology  recognises  only  "  psychic  processes,"  and 
is  not  willing  to  consider  that  any  *'  soul-constitution  " 
enters  to  modify  of  Its  own  force  the  progress  of  the 
race.     Wundt  also  asserted  that  the  field  of  ethnic 


INTRODUCTION  ix 

psychology  Is  already  mainly  occupied  by  general 
ethnology,  or  else  by  the  philosophy  of  history.  Yet 
he  did  not  deny  that  in  a  sphere  strictly  limited  to 
the  subjects  of  language,  custom,  and  myth  such  a 
"  discipline  "  might  do  useful  work. 

In  his  later  writings,  however,  Wundt  seems  to  have 
modified  these  strictures,  and  in  the  last  edition  of 
his  excellent  text-book  acknowledges  that  there  is  no 
antagonism  between  experimental  and  ethnic  psycho- 
logy, as  has  been  sometimes  supposed  ;  that  they  do 
not  occupy  different,  but  parts  of  the  same  fields, 
and  are  distinguished  mainly  by  difference  of  method, 
the  one  resting  on  experiment,  the  other  on  observ- 
ation. 

The  recognition of  ethnic  psychology  by  pro- 
fessed psychologists is^  therefore,    an    accomplished 

fact ;  and  this  was  long  since  anticipated  by  the  gen- 
eral literature  of  history  and  ethnography. 

Who,  for  instance,  has  denied  that  there  is  such  a 
thing  as  ''  racial"  or  ''  national  "  character  ?  Did  any- 
one take  it  into  his  head  to  denounce  as  meaningless 
Emerson's  title,  E7iglisJr'Traits  ?  Does  not  every 
treatise  on  ethnography  assume  that  there  are  certain 
psychical  characteristics  of  races,  tribes,  and  peoples, 
quite  sharply  dividing  them  from  their  neighbours  ? 

Take,  for  instance,  Letourneau's  popular  work,  and 
we   find  him  expressly  claiming  that  the   races   and 


X  INTRODUCTION 

subraces  of  mankind  can  be  classified  by  the  relative 
development  of  their  psychical  powers ;  and  such 
a  "  psychological "  classification  is  not  a  novelty  in 
anthropology. 

/     These  mental  traits,  characteristics,  differences,  be- 
tween human  groups  are  precisely  the  material  which 
ethnic  psychology  takes  as  its  material  for  investiga- 
tions.     Its  aim  is  to  define  them  clearly,  to  explain 
their  origin  and   growth,  and  to   set  forth  what  in- 
fluence they  assert  on  a  people  and  on  Its  neighbours. 
f  f        Ethmc  psychology  does  not  hesitate  to  claim  that 
('     the  separMlon  of  mankind  Into  groups  bv_ psychical 
I     differences  was  and  is  the  one  necessary  condition  of 
human  progress  everywhere  and  at  all   times  ;  and, 
therefore,  that  the  study  of  the  causes  of  these  dlffer- 
ences,  and  the  influence  they  exerted  in  the  direction 
of  evolution  or  regression.  Is  thejnost  essential  of  all 
studies  to  the  pTesentlsjnd  future  welfare  of  humanity. 
In  this  sense,  it  is  not  only  the  guiding  thread  in 
historical  research,  but  It  Is  immediately  and  intensely 
practical,    full   of    application   to   the   social  life   and 
political  measures  of  the  day. 

Some  have  jealously  feared  that  It  offers  itself  as  a 
substitute  for  the  philosophy  of  history.  True  that 
it  draws  some  of  its  material  from  history  ;  but  as 
much  from  ethnography  and  geography.  Moreover, 
it  is  not,  as  history,  a  chronologic,  but  essentially  a 


INTRODUCTION  xi 

natural  science,  depending  for  its  results  on  objective, 
verifiable  facts,  not  on  records  and  documents. 

To  allege  that  this  field  is  already  occupied  is  wide 
of  the  mark.  It  is  no  more  embraced  in  general  eth- 
nology or  in  history  than  experimental  psychology  is 
included  in  general  physiology.  The  advancement 
of  science  depends  on  the  specialisation  of  its  fields 
of  research,  and  it  is  high  time  that  ethnic  psychology 
should  take  an  independent  position  of  its  own. 

To  assist  towards  this  I  shall  aim  in  the  present 
work  to  set  forth  its  method  and  its  aims  as  I  under- 
stand them.  In  both  these  directions  I  offer  schemes 
notably  different  from  those  of  the  authors  I  have 
mentioned,  believing  that  this  science  requires  for 
its  independent  development  much  more  compre- 
hensive outlines  than  will  be  found  in  their  writings. 

The  method,  it  need  hardly  be  said,  must  be  that 
of  the  so-called  "natural  sciences";  but  it  must  be 
based,  as  Wundt  remarks,  not  on  experiment — that 
were  impossible— but_on  observation.  This  is  to  ex- 
tend, not,  as  he  argued,  to  a  few  products  of  culture, 
but  to  everything  which  makes  up  national  or  ethnic 
life,  be  it  an  historic  event,  an  object  of  art,  a  law, 
custom,  rite,  myth,  or  mode  of  expression.  The 
origins  of  these,  in  the  sense  of  their  proximate  or  ex- 
citing causes,  are  to  be  sought,  and  the  conditions  of 
their  growth  and  decay  deduced  from  their  histories. 


xii  INTRODUCTION 

We  are  dealing  with  facts  of  Life,  with  collective 
mental  function  in  action,  and  we  can  appeal,  there- 
torc,  to  the  principles  of  general  biology  to  guide  us. 
We  can,  for  example,  since"  every  organism  bears  in 
its  structure  not  only  the  record  of  its  own  life-his- 
tory   but    the    vestiges    of  "its    ancestry,    confidently 


expect  to  find  in  the  traits  of  nations  the  survivals  of 
their  earlier  and  unrecoided  cuuditions. 


Understood  in  this ^ense,  ethnic"" psychology  does 
n^t  deal  with  mathematics  and  physics,  but  with  col- 
lections of  facts,  feelino^s,  Thoucrhts,  and  historic 
events,  and  seeks  by  comparison  and  analysis  to  dis- 
cover their  causal  relations.  It  is  wholly  objective, 
and  for  that  reason  eminently  a  ''  natural "  science. 
The  objective  truths  with  which  it  deals  are  not  prim- 
ary but  secondary  mental  products,  as  they  are  not 
attached  to  the  individual  but  to  the  group.  For 
this  reason  it  has  an  advantacre  over  other  natural 
sciences  in  that  it  can  with  propriety  search  not  only 
into  growth  but  into  origins,  for,  in  its  purview,  these 
fall  within  the  domain  of  known  facts. 
f  We  must  recognise  that  the  psychical  expressions 
of  life  are  absolutely  and  always  correlated  to  the 
physical  functions  and  structure  ;  and  that,  therefore, 
no  purely  psychicaL causes  can  explain  ethnic  devel- 
opment or  degeneration.     As  the  past  of  an  organism 


INTRODUCTION  xiii 

decides  its  future,  so  the  future  of  a  people  is  already 

written  in  iTs  pasthistory. 

■^  "*■•— — ^— ^— ___ 

As  in  ethnic  psychology  the  material  is  different 
from  that  in  experimental  psychology,  so  in  the 
former  we  must  abandon  the  methods  suitable  in  the 
latter.  The  ethnic  psyche  is  made  up  of  a  number 
of  experiences  common  to  the  mass,  but  not  occur- 
ring in  any  one  of  its  individual  members.  These 
experiences  of  the  aggregate  develop  their  own  varia- 
tions and  modes  of  progress,  and  must  be  studied  for 
themselves,  without  reference  to  the  individual,  hold- 
ing the  processes  of  the  single  mind  as  analogies 
only. 

While  fully  acknowledging  the  inseparable  cor- 
relation between  all  psychical  activities  and  the  phys- 
ical structures  which  condition  them,  let  us  not  fall 
into  the  common  and  gross  error  of  supposing  that 
physical  is  in  any  way  a  measure  of  psychical  function. 
All  measurements  in  experimental  psychology,  be 
they  by  chemistry  or  physics,  are  quantitative  only, 
and  can  be  nothing  else  (Wundt);  whereas  psychical 
comparisons  are  purely  qualitative. 

A  single  example  will  illustrate  this  infinitely  im- 
portant fact : — precisely  the  same  quantity  of  physico- 
chemical  change  may  be  needed  for  the  evolution 
into  consciousness  of  two   ideas ;    but  if  the  one  is 


xiv  INTRODUCTION 

false   and   the    other   true,    their   psychic   values    are 
indefinitely  apart. 

We  perceive,  therefore,  that  in  psychology  gen- 
erally, and  especially  in  ethnic  psychology,  where  we 
deal  with  aggregates,  we  must  draw  a  fundamental 
distinction  between  those  agents  which  act  quan- 
titatively on  the  psychical  life,  that  is,  modify  it  by 
measurable  forces,  and  those  which  act  qualitatively, 
that  is,  by  altering  the  contents  and  direction  of  the 
psycJie  itself. 

The  former  belong  properly  to  "  natural  history," 
and  can  be  measured  and  estimated  just  to  the  ex- 
tent that  we  have  instruments  of  precision  for  the 
purpose ;  the  latter  wholly  elude  any  such  attempts, 
and  must  be  appraised  by  the  results  they  have 
historically  achieved,  that  is,  by  arts,  events,  or 
institutions. 

The  recognition  of  these  two  factors  of  human 
development,  radically  distinct  yet  inseparably  as- 
sociated, has  led  me  to  adopt  the  division  into  two 
parts  of  the  present  work.  The  first  is  the  *'  nat- 
ural," the  second,  the  ''  cultural,"  history  of  the 
ethnic  mind.^ 

>    Note  that  I  'E>2.y  ethnic  mind.      For  let  it  be  said 
here,  as  well  as  repeated  later,  that  there  is  no  such 

'  [The  author  had  apparently  decided  to  reverse  this  order  of  treatment 
after  writing  the  above.  The  "  natural  history  of  the  ethnic  mind  "  forms  the 
second  part  of  the  work. — Editor.] 


INTRODUCTION  xv 

things  as  progress  or  culture  in  the  isolated  individual, 
but  only  iri  the  group,  in  society,  in^  the  ethnos. 
Only  by  taking  and  giving,  borrowing  and  lending, 
can  life  either  improve  or  continue. 

The  "  natural "  history  will  embrace  the  consider- 
ation of  those  general  doctrines  of  continuity  and 
variation  which  hold  true  alike  in  matter  and  in 
mind,  in  the  soul  as  in  the  body,  and  a  review  of  the 
known  forces  which,  acting  through  the  physical 
structure  and  function  upon  the  organs  which  are  the 
vehicles  of  mental  phenomena,  weaken  or  strengthen 
the  psychical  activities. 

The  '*  cultural "  history  will  present  something  of 
a  new  departure  In  anthropology — a  classification  of 
all  ethnologic  data  as  the  products  of  a  few  general 
concepts,  universal  to  the  human  mind,  but  con- 
ditioned In  their  expressions  by  the  natural  history 
of  each  group.  The  justification  of  this  procedure, 
which  is  not  a  return  to  the  ideology  of  an  older 
generation,  will  be  presented  in  the  introduction  to 
the  second  part. 

The  illustrative  examples  I  shall  frequently  draw 
from  savage  conditions  of  life.  This  is  in  accord- 
ance with  the  custom  of  ethnologists,  and  is  based  on 
the  fact  that  in  such  conditions  the  motives  of  action 
are  simpler  and  less_concealed,  and  we  are  nearer  the 
origins  of  arts  and  institutions. 


xvi  INTRODUCTION 

Only  by  such  direct  examples  can  a  true  psy- 
chology be  established.  The  time  has  passed  when 
one  can  seek  the  laws  of  mental  development  from 
the  "inner  consciousness";  and  we  smile  at  even  so 
recent  a  philosopher  as  Cousin,  when  he  tells  us  that, 
to  discover  such  laws,  " //  nous  sujjit  de  rentrer  dans 
nous-mimes.'' 


PART  I 

THE   CULTURAL  HISTORY  OF  THE   ETHNIC   MIND 


>     »   >      ' 


CHAPTER  I 

THE  UNITY  OF  THE  HUMAN  MIND 

IN  a  treatise  on  psychology  we  have  to  do  with 
the  Mind  ;  and  what  is  Mind?  So  far  as  we 
can  define  it,  it  is  the  sum  of  those  activities  which 
distinguish  Hving  from  dead  matter,  the  organism 
from  the  inorofanic  mass. 

So  broad  a  definition  would  include  both  the 
vegetable  and  the  animal  worlds  ;  and  this  is  not  an 
error  ;  but  for  the  present  purpose,  which  is  the  con- 
sideration of  the  mind  of  man,  it  is  enough  if  we 
recognise  that  this  mind  of  his  is  a  development  of 
that  of  the  brute  ;  the  same  in  most  of  its  traits,  con- 
trasted to  it  in  a  few.  It  is  profitable,  in  truth  indis- 
pensable, to  scrutinise  both  closely. 

Identities  and  Differences  of  the  Human  and  tJie 
Brute  Mind. — There  is  a  branch  of  science  called 
''comparative  psychology."  Its  province  is  to  trace 
the  evolution  of  human  mental  powers  to  their  earlier 
phases  in  the  inferior  animals.      So  successfully  has  it 

3 


4  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

been  pursued  that  not  a  few  of  its  teachers  claim  that 
there  is  nothing-  left  as  the  private  property  of  man 
in  this  connection  ;  that  he  has  no  powers  or  faculties 
which  are  peculiarly  his  own  ;  that  all  his  endow- 
ments differ  in  degree  only  from  those  evinced  by 
some  one  or  other  of  the  lower  species. 

The  brute  has  his  fine  senses,  as  acute  as,  often 
acuter  than,  ours  ;  no  one  can  deny  him  emotions  of 
love  and  fear,  hate  and  affection,  sorrow  and  joy,  as 
poignant  as  ours,  and  often  expressed  in  strangely 
similar  modes  ;  his  memory  is  retentive,  his  will 
strong,  his  self-control  remarkable  ;  he  has  a  lively 
curiosity,  a  love  of  imitation,  a  sense  of  the  beautiful, 
and  it  is  acknowledged  that  we  cannot  deny  him 
either  imagination  or  reason.  Mental  progress  is  not 
unknown  in  the  brute,  and  it  is  well  to  remembei 
that  it  is  not  universal  among  men. 

What,  then,  is  man's  proud  prerogative  ?  What  the 
gift  which  has  given  him  the  world  and  all  that 
therein  is  ?  The  answer  is  in  one  vjord,—zdealzoTi. 
The  last  efforts  of  modern  science  can  but  para- 
phrase the  words  which  the  philosopher  Locke 
penned  nigh  two  centuries  ago  :  ''  The  having  of  gen- 
eral ideas  is  that  which  puts  a  perfect  distinction 
between  man  and  brute."  The  latest  American 
writer  on  the  subject  merely  repeats  this  when  he 
phrases  it  "  the  ability  to  think  in  general  terms  by 


THE  UNITY  OF  THE  HUMAN  MIND  5 

using  symbols  (words)  which  summarise  systems  of 
association." 

Let  us  avoid  the  metaphysical  snares  which  have 
been  spread  around  this  simple  statement.  No  mat- 
ter about  such  words  as  "concepts,"  "notions,"  "ap- 
perceptions," "abstractions,"  and  the  like.  Let  us 
fix  in  mind  the  formula  of  Romanes :  "  Distinctively 
human  faculty  belongs  with  distinctively  human  idea- 
tion." This,  the  power  to  form  general  ideas, — which 
are  necessarily  abstract, — is  the  one  prerogative  which 
lifts  man  above  brute.  By  it  he  can  compare  what 
he  learns  and  thus  develop  an  intellectual  life  for 
comparison  ;  to  borrow  the  metaphor  of  a  famous  stud- 
ent of  his  kind,  it  is  the  magic  wand,  the  diamond- 
hiked  sword,  by  which  man  will  conquer  his  salvation 
through  learning  the  truth.  We  exclaim,  with  Pascal, 
"  It  is  Thought  which  makes  Man." 

Outside  of  this  and  its  developments,  all  that  man 
has  of  soul-life__is_in  common  with  the  brute.  Why 
should  he  be  ashamed  of  it  ?  What  folly  to  pretend, 
as  the  common  phrase  goes,  to  "get  rid  of  the  brute 
in  man "  !  Parental  love,  social  instincts,  fidelity, 
friendship,  courage, — these  are  parts  of  his  heritage 
from  his  four-footed  ancestor.  What  would  he  be- 
come, dispossessed  of  them  ? 

Already,  in  that  long  alienation  from  his  brethren 
which  made  man  the  one  species  of  his  genus  and  the 


6  ETHNIC  PS YCHOLOG Y 

one  genus  of  liis  class,  has  he  lost  certain  strange 
powers  of  mind  which  excite  our  special  wonder  when 
we  see  their  manifestations  in  his  remote  relations. 
The  chief  of  these  is  Instinct.  We  are  all  familiar 
with  its  extraordinary  exhibitions  in  bees,  ants,  and 
higher  animals,  and  its  seeming  total  absence  in  our- 
selves.    What  can  we  make  of  it  ? 

Instirict  and  Intelligence. — Throughout  all  nature 
there  is  an  unceasinor  eternal  conflict  between  the  old 
and  the  new,  between  motion  and  rest,  between  the 
fixed  and  the  variable,  between  the  individual  and 
the  universe.  This  cosmic  contest  is  reflected  within 
the  realm  of  animal  life  in  the  contrast  between  In- 
stinct and  Intelliorence. 

Instinct  is  hereditary  ;  jt  belongs  to  the  species  ;  its 
performance  is  unconscious,  resulting  from  internal 
impulse  ;  its  tendency  is  endless  repetition,  not  im- 
provement ;  it  is  petrified,  inherited  habit.  Intel- 
ligence belongs  to  the  individual  ;  it  is  neither 
inherited  nor  transmissible  by  bloody  its  tendency  is 
toward  advancement,  progress.  It  is  the  source  of 
all  knowledge  not  purely  empirical,  and  of  all  devel- 
opment not  of  chance. 

Habits  which  are  forced  upon  organisms  by  the 
environment  under  penalty  of  extinction  become 
hereditary  modes  of  procedure.  They  are  persisted 
in  because  vitally  beneficial.      Comparative  anatomy 


THE  UNITY  OF  THE  HUMAN  MIND  7 

shows  us  that  those  organs  and  structures  which  are 


most  persistent  have  their  functions  most  instinctive  ; 
and  conversely,  as  individual  freedom  of  action  in- 
creases, instinct  retires  and  intelligence  takes  its 
place,  accompanied  by  higher  plasticity  in  the  struct- 
ures involved  in  the  action. 

Intelligent  action  is  personal  initiative  from  com- 
pared experiences.  It  is  not  merely  repetition,  as  in 
the  tricks  of  animals,  but  deduction  ;  therefore  it  in- 
troduces new  tendencies  into  life,  which  instinct  never 
does  ;  and  these  tendencies  are  not  the  direct  sequences 
of  external  stimuli,  as  are  instincts,  but  are  psychic  in 
origin,  proceeding  from  the  mental  conclusion  reached. 

No  more  interesting  comparison  between  instinct 
and  intelligence  can  be  found  than  that  offered  by  the 
social  communities  of  the  lower  animals, — the  bees, 
ants,  beavers,  and  the  like.  Their  well-regulated  act- 
ivities excite  our  surprise  and  admiration.  Each 
member  of  the  little  state  has  his  duty  and  performs 
it,  with  the  result  that  all  are  thereby  benefited  and 
the  species  successfully  perpetuated. 

But  much  of  the  admiration  expended  on  these 
societies  in  the  lower  life  has  been  misplaced.  Their 
perfect  organisation  is  due  to  narrower  development 
of  mental  powers.  The  one  object  at  which  they 
aim  is  species-continuation,  and  to  this  all  else  is  sub- 
ordinated.    They  are  in  no  sense  comparable  to  the 


8  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

reflective  purpose  which  is  at  the  base  of  human 
society,  whose  real,  though  oft  unacknowledged,  and 
ever  unsuccessful,  aim  is  to  insure  to  each  individual 
the  full  development  of  his  various  powers.  Hence 
it  is  that  human  society  is  and  must  be  ever  chan- 
ging with  individual  aspirations,  and  can  never  be 
iron-bound  in  one  form. 

Imagination. — There  is  another  faculty  of  mind, 
which,  if  not  exclusively  human,  is  so  in  all  its 
higher  manifestations,  and  indeed  is,  in  its  devel- 
opment, perhaps  the  best  mental  criterion  we  could 
select  to  measure  the  evolution  of  races,  nations,  and 
individuals.  I  refer  to  Imagination,  Fancy,  the  source 
of  our  noblest  enthusiasms,  of  our  loftiest  sentiments, 
of  poetic  rapture,  and  artistic  inspiration.  These 
spiritual  sentiments  are  wholly  absent  in  the  brute, 
and  are  rare  in  inferior  personalities.  They  arise 
from  the  vivid  presentation  to  the  mind  of  real  or 
fancied  experiences  directed  to  some  end  in  view. 
But  this  is  just  the  definition  of  active  imagina- 
tion. It  is  a  rehearsal  of  our  perceptions,  real,  or 
those  analogous  to  reality.  Though  not  a  collation 
of  ideas,  its  processes  are  closely  akin  to  those  of 
logical  thought ;  and,  as  an  eminent  analyst  says, 
*'  The  principle  of  an  organic  division  according  to 
an  end  in  view  governs  all  processes  of  active 
imagination." 


THE  UNITY  OF  THE  HUMAN  MIND  9 

In  this  phrase  we  see  why  imagination  ranks  as  a 
criterion  of  mental  development.  Ruled  chiefly  by 
unconscious  instinct  the  brute  has  no  other  aims  than 
to  feed  and  sleep  and  reproduce  his  kind  ;  men  of 
low  degree  add  to  these,  perhaps,  the  lust  of  power  or 
of  gold  or  of  amusement,  or  other  such  vain  and 
paltry  ambitions  ;  but  the  soul  that  seeks  the  highest 
has  aims  beyond  all  fulfilment,  but  which  by  their 
glory  stimulate  its  activities  to  the  utmost  and  lift  it 
into  a  life  above  all  mundane  satisfactions. 

The  Ideal, — By  the  plastic  power  of  the  active  im- 
agination is  formed  the  Ideal,  the  most  potent  of  all 
the  stimulants  of  the  hlcrher  culture.  Based  on  real- 
ity  and  experience,  it  transcends  the  possibilities  of 
both,  and  lifts  the  soul  Into  realms  whose  light  is  not 
on  sea  or  land,  and  whose  activities  aim  at  results  be- 
yond any  present  power  of  human  nature  to  achieve. 
But  it  is  only  by  striving  for  that  which  is  beyond  reach 
that  the  utmost  effort  possible  can  be  called  forth. 

The  ideal,  some  ideal,  is  present  in  every  human 
heart.  It  is  the  ofoal  toward  which  each  strives  In 
seeking  pleasure  and  in  avoiding  pain.  Through  the 
unity  of  the  human  mind,  the  same  Ideals,  few  In 
number,  have  directed  the  energies  of  men  in  all 
times  and  climes.  Around  them  have  concentrated 
the  labours  of  nations,  and  as  one  or  the  other  became 
more  prominent,   national    character  partook   of    its 


lo  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

inspiration,  and  national  history  fell  under  its  sway. 
Constantly  in  the  history  of  culture  do  we  see  such 
general  devotion  to  an  ideal  lead  groups  toward  or 
away  from  the  avenue  to  progress  and  vitality. 

Co7isciousness  and  Self-  Co7isciousness. —  Through 
ideation  arises  man's  consciousness  of  himself  as  an 
independent  personality.  In  its  broadest  sense,  that 
of  reaction  to  an  external  stimulus,  consciousness  is 
a  property  of  all  animals,  perhaps  of  all  organic 
tissues.  Contractility  and  motility  depend  upon  it. 
What  it  is,  *'  in  itself,"  we  have  no  means  of  knowing ; 
therefore  it  is  safe  to  agree  with  Professor  Cope  in 
his  negative  opinion  that  it  "  is  qualitatively  com- 
parable to  nothing  else." 

In  simpler  forms  of  organic  life  it  must  be  merely 
rudimentary;  but  in  most  animals  it  reaches  what 
has  been  called  the  "projective"  stage  ;  that  is,  the 
animal  is  conscious  of  the  existence  of  others,  like  or 
unlike  himself,  though  he  is  not  yet  conscious  of  him- 
self as  a  separate  entity.  This  has  been  held  to 
explain,  psychologically,  the  ''gregarious  instincts" 
of  many  lower  species. 

As  a  result  of  the  absence  of  general  concepts,  the 
brute  does  not  contemplate  himself  as  a  single  indi- 
vidual in  contrast  to  the  others  of  his  species.  He  is 
unable  to  class  these  under  a  general  term  or  thought. 
Hence  j^//*-consciousness  belongs  to. man  alone.__ 


THE  UNITY  OF  THE  HUMAN  MIND  1 1 

Attempting  to  define  this  trait,  we  may  say  that  it 
is  the  perception  of  the  unity  and  continuity  of  the 
individual's  psychological  activities.  Just  in  propor- 
tion as  this  perception  becomes  clear,  positive,  sharply 
defined,  does  the  individual  become  aware  of  his  own 
life,  his  real  existence,  its  laws,  and  its  purposes. 

Hence  the  study  of  this  mental  characteristic  be- 
comes of  the  highest  importance  in  ethnology  ;  for  it 
has  been  well  said  (Post)  that  the  growth  or  decay 
of  individual  self-consciousness  is  an  unfailing  meas- 
ure of  the  growth  or  decay  of  States. 

Physiologically,  the  sense  of  self,  the  Ego,  is  pro- 
duced by  outgoing  discharges  from  the  central  nerv- 
ous system  which  are  felt.  They  may  arise  from 
external  forces  or  from  the  internal  source  which  we 
call  Volition,  or  Will.  In  both  cases  the  repetition  of 
feeling  them  yields  the  notion  of  Personality. 

It  i$  instructive  to  note  how  differently  races  and 
nations  have  understood  and  still  do  understand  this 
notion  ;  instructive,  because  it  has  much  to  do  with 
their  characters  and  actions. 

Naturally  enough  many  have  identified  the  /with 
the  body,  or  with  that  portion  of  the  body  least  de- 
structible, the  bones.  For  this  reason,  in  Egypt, 
Peru,  Teneriffe,  and  many  other  localities  there  was 
the  practice  of  preserving  the  entire  body  by  exsicca- 
tion  or    mummification,   the   belief  being  that,  were 


12  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

it  destroyed,  the  personal  existence  of  the  decedent 
would  also  perish.  In  other  lands  the  bones  were 
carefully  guarded  in  ossuaries  or  shrines,  for  in  them 
the  soul  was  held  to  abide. 

Not  less  widely  received  was  another  opinion,  that 
the  self  dwells  in  the  name.  The  personal  name  was 
therefore  conferred  with  ceremony,  and  frequently 
was  not  disclosed  beyond  the  family.  The  individual 
could  be  injured  through  his  name,  his  personality 
impaired  by  its  misuse. 

In  higher  conditions  the  Person  is  usually  defined 
by  attributes  and  environment,  as  sex,  age,  calling, 
property,  and  the  like.  Ask  a  man  who  he  is,  he 
will  define  himself  "  by  name  and  standing." 
L— E£w__reach  the  conception  of  abstract  Individuality, 
apart  from  the  above  incidents  of  time  and  place  ; 
SO  that  it  is  easy  to  see  that  self-consciousness  is  still 
,  in  little  more  than  aii,  embryonic  stage  of  develop- 
ment in  humanity.  It  differs  notably  in  races  and 
stages  of  culture.      Dr.  Van   Brero  comments  on  the 


\    slig^ht    sense    of    personality    among    the    Malayan 

islanders,  and  attributes  to  that  their  exemption  from 

I  certain  nervous  diseases.      Its  morbid  development  in 

\  self-attention  and  Ego-mania  is  frequently  noticed  in 

the  asylums  of  highly  civilised  centres. 

T  shall   have  frequent   occasion   to   insist  that  the 
utmost   healthful,  that  is,  symmetrical,   development 


THE  UNITY  OF  THE  HUMAN  MIND  13 

of  the  individuality  is  the  true  aim  of  human  society. 
This  is  directly  due  to  the  fact  that  self-conscious- 
ness, the  "  I  "  in  its  final  analysis,  depends  on  the 
unity  and  independence  of  the  individual  Will,  which 
in  a  given  moment  of  action  can  be  One  only.  The 
cultivation  of  individuality  is  therefore  the  cultivation 
of  the  will,  to  direct  and  strengthen  which  must  be 
the  purpose  of  all  education. 

The  Intellectual  Pf^ocess. — The  chasm  between  the 
human  and  the  brute  mind  widens  when  we  come  to 
look  more  closely  at  the  various  steps  of  the  intel- 
lectual process,  that  is,  at  the  method  of  reasoning. 
To  be  either  clear  or  conscious,  this  must  be  carried 
on  by  general  ideas,  in  themselves  abstractions.  For 
example,  the  so-called  **  syllogisms "  of  logic  depend 
upon  the  relation  of  a  general  to  a  particular  idea  ;  and 
thinkinof  can  no  more  be  conducted  without  this  re- 
lation  than  talking  without  grammatical  rules  ;  though 
neither  the  formula  of  the  syllogism  nor  the  rules  of 
grammar  are  consciously  present  to  the  mind. 

The  logical  process  is  everywhere  and  at  all  times 
the  same,  in  the  sage  or  the  savage,  the  sane  or  the 
insane.  To  reach  any  conclusion,  the  mind  must 
work  in  accordance  with  its  method.  This  is  purely 
mechanical.  An  English  philosopher  (Jevons)  in- 
vented a  "  logical  machine,"  which  worked  as  well  as 
the    human    brain.     The    logical    process    has    been 


14  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

formulated  by  a  mathematician  (Boole)  In  a  simple 
equation  of  the  second  degree.  It  must  consist  of 
subject  and  predicate,  of  general  and  particular.  But 
the  process  has  nothing  to  do  with  the  proceeds.  A 
mill  grinds  equally  well  wheat,  tares,  and  poison- 
berries.  Not  upon  the  fact  that  the  pepsin  digests, 
but  that  it  digests  proper  aliments,  depends  the 
health  of  the  body.  So  the  content  of  the  Intellect- 
ual operation,  not  its  form,  is  of  good  or  harm,  and 
merits  the  attention  of  ethnographer  or  historian. 

The  Mechanical  Action  of  Mind. — The  Germans 
have  a  saying,  framed  first  by  their  writer,  Lichten- 
stein,  known  as  "the  Magician  of  the  North,"  that 
"  lue  do  not  think.  Thinking  merely  goes  on  within 
us  "  ;  just  as  our  stomachs  digest  and  our  glands  ex- 
crete. Another  one  of  their  authors  orlelnated  the 
once -celebrated  apothegm,  "Without  phosphorus 
there  is  no  thouorht." 

o 

The  aim  of  both  expressions  is  to  put  pointedly  the 
principle  that  the  intellectual  process  is  of  a  mechan- 
ico-chemical  character,  a  mere  bodily  function,  to  be 
classed  with  digestion  or  circulation.  This  opinion 
has  of  late  years  been  warmly  espoused  in  the  United 
States. 

That  intellectual  actions  are  governed  by  fixed  laws 
was  long  ago  said  and  demonstrated  by  Ouetelet  in 
his  remarkable  studies  of  vital  statistics.      That  the 


THE  UNITY  OF  THE  HUMAN  MIND  15 

development  of  thought  proceeds  ''  under  the  rule  of 
an  iron  necessity  "  is  the  ripened  conviction  of  that 
profound  student  of  man,  Bastian.  We  must  accept 
it  as  the  verdict  of  science. 

What,  then,  becomes  of  individuality,  personality, 
free-will  ?  Must  we,  as  the  great  dramatist  said,  ''  con- 
fess ourselves  the  slaves  of  chance,  the  flies  of  every 
wind  that  blows  "  ? 

Not  yet.  That  we  are  subject  to  our  surroundings 
and  our  history  ;  that  our  forefathers,  though  dead, 
have  not  relaxed  their  parental  grasp  ;  that  time,  clime, 
'and  spot  master  thought  and  deed.  Is  all  true.  But 
;  above  all  is  Volition,  Will,  a  final.  Insoluble,  personal 
power,  the  one  Irrefragable  proof  of  separate  exist- 
;ence,  not  Itself  translatable  into  Force,  but  the 
director,  initiator,  of  all  vital  forces. 

The  ''Psychic  Cells'' — Mind  brings  man  into  kin- 
ship with  all  organic  life.  Long  ago  Aristotle  said 
if  one  would  explain  the  human  soul,  he  must  ac- 
complish it  through  learning  the  souls  of  all  other 
belno^s. 

The  physiologist  explains  mental  phenomena  as 
the  function  of  specialised  cell-life.  He  points  out 
the  cells,  strange  triangular  masses  in  the  cortex 
of  the  brain,  with  long  processes  and  spiny  branches, 
touchinof  but  never  unitlnor.  In  the  lower  animals 
the  network  Is  simple,  the  branches  short ;  as  mental 


i6  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

capacity  advances,  they  become  more  complex  and 
lonorer. 

CD 

These  are  the  ''psychic  cells  "  In  whose  microscopic 
laboratory  Is  worked  the  magic  of  mind,  transforming 
waves  of  impact,  some  into  sweet  music,  others  into 
colour  and  light  and  all  the  glory  of  the  landscape  ; 
changing  sights  and  sounds  into  emotions  of  joy  or 
dread ;  transmitting  them  into  passions  or  lusts ; 
assorting  the  gathered  stores  of  comparison,  and 
from  them  building  ideas  base  or  noble,  and  awaken- 
ing the  Will  to  direct  the  use  of  all. 

The  Question  of  Soid. — But,  It  will  be  exclaimed, 
in  this  discussion  of  Mind,  is  nothing  to  be  said  of 
a  Sold?  Has  man  not  an  immortal  element  which 
removes  him  Infinitely  from  the  brute  which  perishes, 
and  which  guarantees  his  personal  existence  after 
death  ? 

The  answer  of  modern  science  is  that  between 
"  mind "  and  "  soul  "  no  distinction  can  be  drawn  ; 
and  that  this  very  quality  of  "  ideation "  is  not  a 
sudden  acquisition,  some  free  gift  of  the  gods,  be- 
stowed full-blown  and  perfected,  but  the  development 
of  a  very  slow  process,  traceable  in  its  beginnings  in 
some  beasts,  faint  in  the  lowest  men,  strictly  con- 
ditioned on  the  growth  of  articulate  expression,  far 
from  complete  in  the  ripest  intellects.  It  neither 
excludes    nor    assumes    persistence   after   corporeal 


THE  UNITY  OF  THE  HUMAN  MIND  17 

death.  We  may  use  the  word  "  soul,"  therefore, 
because  it  is  rich  in  associations ;  but  use  it  as  a 
synonym  of  "mind." 

The  soul  is  not  some  transcendental  substance 
outside  of  the  individual,  but  exists  by  virtue  of  the 
connection  of  his  psychic  processes  with  each  other. 
This  does  not  lessen  the  reality  of  his  personal  ex- 
istence, but  explains  it. 

As  for  the  relation  which  mind  or  soul  in  general 
bears  to  the  material  external  world,  most  thinkers 
are  of  opinion  now  that  the  contrast  formerly 
supposed  to  exist  is  one  merely  of  view-point ;  that 
natural  science  considers  all  our  experiences  as  ex- 
ternal, while  mental  science  studies  them  as  wholly 
internal. 

Are  the  Mental  Faculties  the  Same  in  Man  Every- 
where?— The  lines  thus  "clearly  drawn  between  the 
human  and  the  brute  mind,  we  ask,  do  they  hold 
good  for  the  whole  human  species,  of  all  races  and 
degrees  of  culture  ?  And  has  man  in  the  past  always 
possessed  these  faculties  which  have  been  thus  at- 
tributed to  him  alone  of  all  orcranised  beini^s  ? 

To  these  inquiries  I  shall  address  myself. 

It  is  true,  as  I  shall  have  many  occasions  to 
show  hereafter,  that  in  mental  endowment  tribes 
and  races  widely  differ  ;  but  so  do  individuals  of  the 
same  race,  even  of  the  same  family  ;  and  in  regard 


i8  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

to  many  of  these  differences  we  can  so  accurately 
put  our  finger  on  what  brings  it  about  that  we  have 
but  to  alter  conditions  in  order  to  alter  endowments. 
/^The  Fuegian  savage  is  one  of  the  worst  specimens 
'of  the  genus  ;  but  put  him  when  young  in  an  Eng- 
lish school,  and  he  will  grow  up  an  intelligent  mem- 
ber of  civilised  society.  However  low  man  is,  he 
can  be  instructed,  improved,  redeemed ;  and  it  is 
this  most  cheerinor  fact  which  should  encouraee  us  in 
incessant  labour  for  the  degraded  and  the  despised 
of  humanity. 

There  is  another  proof,  strong,  convincing,  of  the 
substantial  sameness  of  the  human  mind  throuorhout 
the  species.  This  is  Language,  articulate  speech. 
No  tribe  has  ever  been  known  in  history  or  ethno- 
graphy but  had  a  language  ample  for  Its  needs.  The 
speechless  man.  Homo  alalus,  is  a  fiction  of  a  philo- 
sopher.     He  never  lived. 

Language,  however,  is  the  guarantor  of  thought  in 
general  terms.  The  words  are  the  ''  associative  sym- 
bols "  of  abstract  ideas.  Wherever  men  talk,  they 
think  In  a  solely  human  fashion. 

Philologists  talk  of  "  higher  "  or  "  lower  "  languages. 
The  assertion  has  been  made  that  some  more  than 
others  favor  abstract  expressions.  Such  statements 
may  be  granted  ;  but  the  fact  remains  that  every  word 


THE  UNITY  OF  THE  HUMAN  MIND  19 

itself  is  the  symbol  of  an  abstraction,  and  only  as  such 
can  it  be  rationally  uttered. 

We  can  trace  language  back  to  its  pristine  rudi- 
ments, to  the  form  that  it  must  have  had  among  the 
hordes  of  the  "  old  stone  age,"  cave-dwellers,  naked 
savages.  I  have  made  such  an  attempt.  But  the 
essentials  of  speech  as  a  vehicle  of  thought  still  re- 
main ;  and  though  doubtless  there  was  a  period  when 
articulate  separated  from  inarticulate  speech,  that  was 
during  the  morning  twilight  of  man's  day  on  earth, 
when  he  as  yet  scarcely  merited  the  name  of  man. 

From  all  analogy  we  may  be  confident  that  the 
early  palaeolithic  men  who  shaped  the  symmetrical 
axes  of  Acheul,  scrapers,  punches,  and  hammers  ; 
who  carefully  selected  and  tested  the  flint-fiakes  ;  who 
had  enough  of  an  eye  for  beauty  to  preserve  fine 
quartz  pebbles  ;  and  who  lived  in  social  groups,  in 
stationary  homes  along  watercourses, — these  men  un- 
questionably had  a  spoken  language,  and  minds  com- 
petent to  deal  in  simple  abstractions.  Yet  these  are 
the  most  ancient  men  of  whom  we  know  anything, 
dwellers  in  central  Europe  before  the  Great  Ice  Age. 

When  we  have  such  evidence  as  this  for  the  psychi- 
cal unity  of  the  human  species,  is  it  worth  while  going 
into  that  antiquated  discussion  of  the  "  monogenists  " 
and  *'  polygenists  "  as  to  whether  man  owns  one  or 


20  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

several  birthplaces  ?  Surely  not.  We  declare  all  na- 
tions of  the  earth  to  be  of  one  blood  by  the  judg- 
ment of  a  higher  court  than  anatomy  can  furnish ; 
though  it  also  hands  down  no  dissenting  opinion. 

The  Elementary  Ideas  and  their  Development. — 
These  two  principles,  or  rather  demonstrated  truths, 
— the  unity  of  the  mind  of  man,  and  the  substantial 
uniformity  of  its  action  under  like  conditions, — form 
the  broad  and  secure  foundation  for  Ethnic  Psy- 
chology. They  confirm  the  validity  of  its  results  and 
guarantee  its  methods. 

As  there  are  conditions  which  are  universal,  such 
as  the  structure  and  functions  of  the  body,  its  general 
relations  to  its  surroundings,  its  needs  and  powers, 
these  developed  everywhere  at  first  the  like  psychical 
activities,  or  mental  expressions.  They  constitute 
what  Bastian  has  happily  called  the  "  elementary 
ideas"  of  our  species.  In  all  races,  overall  contin- 
ents, they  present  themselves  with  a  wonderful 
sameness,  which  led  the  older  students  of  man  to  the 
fallacious  supposition  that  they  must  have  been  bor- 
rowed from  some  common  centre. 

Nor  are  they  easily  obliterated  under  the  stress  of 
new  experiences  and  changed  conditions.  With  that 
tenacity  of  life  which  characterises  simple  and  prim- 
itive forms,  they  persist  through  periods  of  divergent 
and  higher  culture,  hiding  under  venerable    beliefs, 


THE  UNITY  OF  THE  HUMAN  MIND  21 

emerging  with  fresh  disguises,  but  easily  detected  as 
but  repetitions  of  the  dear  primordial  faiths  of  the 
race. 

The  Ethnic  Ideas  a7id  their  Origin. — From  the 
monotonous  unity  of  the  elementary  ideas,  the  com- 
mon property  of  mankind  in  its  earliest  stages  of 
development,  branched  off  the  mental  life  of  each 
group  and  tribe,  not  discarding  the  old,  but  adding 
the  new  under  the  external  compulsion  of  environ- 
ment and  experience. 

Where  such  externals  were  alike  or  nearly  so,  the 
progress  was  parallel  ;  where  unlike,  it  was  divergent ; 
analogous  in  this  to  well-known  doctrines  of  the 
bioloofist. 

Such  branches  were  constantly  blending  in  peace 
or  colliding  in  war,  leading  to  a  perpetual  interaction 
of  the  one  growth  with  the  other,  engendering  a  com- 
plexity of  relation  to  each  other  and  to  the  primitive 
substratum.  But  the  ethnic  character,  once  crystal- 
lised, remained  as  ingrained  as  the  national  life  or  the 
bodily  stigmata.  It  compelled  the  members  as  a  mass 
to  look  at  life  and  its  aims  through  certain  lights,  to 
comprehend  the  world  under  certain  forms,  to  move 
to  a  measure,  and  dance  to  a  tune. 

Such  is  the  power  of  the  Ethnic  Mind,  fraught 
with  weal  or  woe  for  the  nation  over  whom  it  rules, 
tyrannical,    portentous,  a   blind  natural  force,  which 


22  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

may  lift  its  helpless   followers  to  skyey  heights  or 
drag  them  into  the  abyss. 

How  it  is  formed  and  what  decides  its  fateful 
beneficent  or  maleficent  decrees,  I  shall  consider  in 
detail  in  the  next  chapters. 


/  CHAPTER   II 

y 

THE  INDIVIDUAL  AND  THE  GROUP.     THE 
ETHNIC  MIND 

'T'HE  ethnic  character  becomes  more  fixed  with 
■*  advancing  culture,  and  its  component  parts — 
that  is,  the  individuals  who  compose  it — more  uniform. 
This  has  not  been  understood  by  one  of  the  latest 
writers  on  the  subject.  Professor  Vierkandt,  who 
maintains  that  in  savage  groups  there  is  a  much  greater 
sameness  between  the  individuals  who  compose  them. 
Superficially,  this  is  true  on  account  of  the  limited 
range  'of  their  activity ;  but  in  proportion  to  that 
range  the  individuals  differ  more  widely,  because  they 
are  so  much  more  subjected  to  external  influences 
and  emotional  attacks.  Dr.  Krejci  is  more  correct  in 
his  opinion  that  the  sum  of  the  differences  between 
cultured  individuals  and  peoples  is  less  than  that  be- 
tween the  uncultured.  This  obviously  flows  from 
the  fact  that  cultivated  minds  are  governed  by  reason 
and  knowledge,  whose  prescriptions  are  everywhere 


24  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

the  same  ;  while  illiterate  minds  are  victims  of  ignor- 
ance and  passion.  All  who  learn  that  twice  two  are 
four  act  on  the  knowledge  of  it  ;  but  the  Brazilian  In- 
dian, who  has  no  word  in  his  language  for  numerals 
above  two,  may  disregard  it. 

Some  have  maintained  that  the  promptings  of  the 
group-mind  as  felt  by  the  individual  belong  in  the 
unconscious  or  involuntary  part  of  his  nature,  and 
partake  of  the  character  of  mechanical  necessity. 

There  is  indeed  this  tendency,  but  it  is  not  by  any 
means  a  necessary  character  of  the  collective  mind,  as 
an  example  easily  shows.  I  may  adopt  a  prevailing 
custom  or  belief  merely  through  imitation,  which  is  a 
mechanical  procedure  ;  or  I  may  adopt  it,  being  led 
to  examine  it  from  its  prevalence  and  to  approve  it 
from  my  examination, — and  this  is  a  voluntary  action. 

In  this  we  see  the  contrast  of  cultured  and  uncult- 
ured group-minds.  The  latter  demand  assent  merely 
from  their  unanimity,  the  former  wish  it  only  from 
enlightenment ;  the  latter  ask  faith,  the  former  know- 
ledge ;  the  latter  command  obedience,  the  former 
urge  investigation. 

Plato  has  a  dialogue  on  the  problem  of  "The  One 
and  the  Many  "  ;  and  the  abstract  subtleties  he  brings 
forward  are  almost  paralleled  by  the  concrete  facts 
which  we  encounter  in  an  endeavour  to  state  the 
mutual  relations  of  the  Individual  and  the  Group. 


THE  INDIVIDUAL  AND  THE  GROUP  25 

This  science  of  ours,  ethnic  psychology,  has,  in 
one  sense,  nothing  to  do  with  the  individual.  It 
does  not  start  from  his  mind  or  thoughts  but  from 
the  mind  of  the  group  ;  its  laws  are  those  of  the 
group  only,  and  in  nowise  true  of  the  individual  ;  it 
omits  wide  tracts  of  activities  which  belong  to  the  in- 
dividual and  embraces  others  in  which  he  has  no 
share  ;  to  the  extent  that  it  does  study  him,  it  is  solely 
in  his  relation_i£>__pthers,  and  not  in  the  least  for 
himself.     / 

On  tTie  other  hand,  as  the  group  is  a  generic  con- 
cept only,  it  has  no  objective  existence.  It  lives  only 
in  the  Individuals  which  compose  it ;  and  only  by 
studying  them  singly  can  we  reach  any  fact  or  princi- 
ple which  is  true  of  them  in  the  aggregate. 

Yet  it  is  almost  as  correct  to  maintain  that  the 
group  is  that  which  alone  of  the  two  is  real.  The 
closer  we  study  the  individual,  the  more  do  his  alleged 
individualities  cease,  as  such,  and  disappear  in  the 
general  laws  by  virtue  of  which  society  exists  ;  the 
less  baggage  does  he  prove  to  have  which  is  really 
his  own  ;  the  more  do  all  his  thoughts,  traits,  and  feat- 
ures turn  out  to  be  those  of  others  ;  so  that,  at  last, 
he  melts  into  the  mass,  and  there  is  nothing  left  which 
he  has  a  right  to  claim  as  his  personal  property.  His 
pretended  personal  mind  is  the  reflex  of  the  group- 
minds  around  him,  as  his  body  is  in  every  fibre  and 


26  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

cell  the  repetition  of  his  species  and  race.  As  an 
American  writer  strongly  puts  it :  "  Morally  I  am  as 
much  a  part  of  society  as  physically  I  am  a  part  of 
the  world's  fauna." 

But  let  no  one  deduce  from  this  that  the  group 
is  merely  the  sum  total  of  the  individuals  which  com- 
pose it,  the  net  balance  of  their  thoughts  and  lives. 
Nothing  would  be  more  erroneous.  I  have  already 
said  that  laws  and  processes  belong  to  the  group 
which  are  foreign  to  the  individual.  We  may  go  fur- 
ther, and  prove  that  these  processes,  the  spirit  of  the 
group,  are  quite  different  from  those  of  any  single 
member  of  it.  To  use  the  expression  of  Wundt : 
"  The  resultant  arising  from  united  psychological 
processes  includes  contents  which  are  not  present  in 
the  components." 

In  numerous  respects,  indeed,  the  individual  and 
the  group  stand  in  opposition  to  each  other.  The 
qualities  of  the  former  are  incoherent,  disorderly, 
irregular  ;  while  those  of  the  latter  are  fixed,  stable, 
computable. 

Let  us  contemplate  further  this  relation  of  the 
individual  to  the  group,  for  upon  its  correct  appre- 
hension must  the  whole  fabric  of  ethnic  psychology, 
as  a  science,  rest. 

In  every  healthy  individual  there  is  a  feeling 
that  his  thoughts  and   actions  are   vain  unless  they 


THE  INDIVIDUAL  AND  THE  GROUP  27 

are  somehow  directed  towards  his  fellow  human 
beings ;  yet  there  is  a  further  feeling  that  these 
fellow  creatures  are  but  a  means  for  the  developing 
and  perfecting  of  himself.  He  desires  to  be  in- 
timately associated  with  the  group,  but  not  to  be 
absorbed  and  lost  in  it.  His  unconscious  goal  is 
individuality,  but  not  isolation  ;  and  he  feels  that  the 
most  complete  and  sane  individuality  can  be  ob- 
tained only  by  association  with  others  of  his  kind. 
For  that  reason,  he  submits  his  will  to  the  collective 
will,  his  consciousness  to  the  collective  conscious- 
ness. He  accepts  from  the  group  the  ideas,  con- 
clusions, and  opinions  common  to  it,  and  the  motives 
of  volition,  such  as  customs  and  rules  of  conduct, 
which  It  collectively  sanctions. 

These  ideas  and  motives  are  strictly  the  property 
of  the  group,  not  of  its  separate  members.  Such  a 
prevailing  unity  of  thought  and  sentiment  does  not 
rest  on  unanimity  of  opinion  ;  it  does  not  necessaril)- 
exclude  any  amount  of  individuality,  and  is  consist- 
ent with  the  utmost  freedom  of  the  personal  mind. 
Its  basis  is  a  similarity  of  form  and  direction  of  the 
psychical  activities,  guiding  and  modifying  them  in 
such  a  way  that  a  general  colour  and  tendency  can 
be  recocrnised. 

o 

If  it  Is  asked,  on  what  ultimate  psychical  concept 
the  differences  of  collective  or  group-minds  are  based 


28  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

In  a  last  analysis,  I  am  inclined  to  answer  with 
Wilhelm  von  Humboldt,  that  it  is  on  the  currently 
accepted  relation  of  the  material  to  the  immaterial 
world.  The  solution  adopted  for  this  insoluble  prob- 
lem is  the  hidden  spring  of  motive  in  the  minds 
of  all. 

The  actual  existence  of  the  group-mind  can  no 
more  be  denied  than  the  constant  inter-relation  be- 
tween it  and  the  individual  mind.  It  takes  nothing 
from  its  reality  that  it  exists  only  in  individual  wills. 
To  deny  it  on  that  account,  as  Wundt  admirably 
says,  is  as  illogical  as  to  deny  the  existence  of  a 
building  because  the  single  stones  of  which  it  is 
composed  may  be  removed.  Indeed,  it  might  claim 
higher  reality  than  the  individual  mind  in  that  its 
will  is  more  potent  and  can  attain  greater  results  by 
collective  action. 

Of  course,  there  is  no  metaphysical  '*  substance " 
or  mythological  "  being  "  behind  the  collective  mind. 
That  were  a  nonsensical  notion.  Nor  is  it  in  any 
sense  a  voluntary  invention,  created  by  contract  for 
utilitarian  ends.  That  were  a  gross  misconception. 
It  is  the  actual  agreement  and  interaction  of  in- 
dividuals resulting  in  mental  modes,  tendencies,  and 
powers  not  belonging  to  any  one  member,  and  mov- 
ing under  laws  developed  by  the  requirements  of  this 
independent  existence.      It  is  like  an  orchestra  which 


THE  INDIVIDUAL  AND  THE  GROUP     '      29 

can  produce  harmonies  by  the  blending  of  the 
strains  of  numerous  instruments  impossible  to  any- 
one of  them. 

The  sense  or  self-recognition  of  individual  life  as 
apart  from  group  life  varies  widely.  In  the  totemic 
bonds  of  savage  life,  In  the  guilds  of  higher  grades, 
in  the  ''society  centres"  of  modern  life,  the  individ- 
ual consciously  and  willingly  renounces  nearly  the 
whole  of  himself  in  favour  of  the  circle  which  he 
enters. 

When  he  attempts  the  opposite  extreme,  and 
prides  himself  on  his  insulation,  his  egotism,  and 
antagonism  to  others,  he  usually  deceives  himself. 
No  matter  how  selfishly  he  pursues  his  aims,  it  is 
ever  in  obedience  to  the  Influence  of  the  group. 
From  It  he  takes  his  thoughts  and  the  language  in 
which  to  express  them,  his  economic  values  are  those 
recognised  by  it,  its  ideals  are  his,  he  will  strive  in 
vain  to  escape  the  iron  bands  of  the  social  order 
about  him.  Unknown  to  himself,  he  abides  the 
slave  of  others. 

The  group  has  another  advantage  over  him  which 
he  can  in  no  wise  diminish  or  avoid.  He  will  die, 
but  It  will  live.  He,  with  his  petty  strivings  and 
personal  ambitions,  will  soon  sink  Into  the  dateless 
night,  but  the  social  order  of  which  he  was  a  part 
will  survive  in  other  and  younger  generations,  moving 


30  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

forward  to  Its  destiny  under  compulsive  forces  of 
which  he  has  not  even  an  inkHng,  crushing  his  bHnd 
opposition  under  resistless  wheels. 

'  Not  by  antagonism  to  the  group  does  the  individ- 
ual gain  his  highest  personal  aims,  his  fullest  reality 
as  an  individual,  but  by  devoting  himself  to  the  best 
interests  of  the  group,  learning  what  they  really  are, 
and  furthering  them  by  a  study  of  the  means  adapted 
to  their  growth  and  fruition.  This  Is  "  altruism," 
the  living  for  others,  In  its  highest  sense,  the  aim  not 
primarily  the  individual,  but  the  group  and  Its  welfare. 

This  is  the  more  needful  because  the  group,  as  a 
psychical  unit,  is  never  creative.  It  is  receptive,  act- 
ive, executive,  but  for  Its  creative  inspirations  it 
depends  upon  the  Individual.  What  Is  called  "origin- 
ality," the  stimuli  and  momenta  of  development,  arise 
primarily  from  the  single  mind. 

But  it  is  equally  true  that  the  work  of  the  group 
must  precede  the  work  of  the  individual,  and  prepare 
for  it,  if  it  is  to  be  successful.  Otherwise,  the  seed 
will  be  sown  on  barren  ground. 

In  every  historic  event  the  group  is  the  only  active 
agent  ;  through  it  the  Individual  can  bring  to  bear 
his  limited  powers  over  an  Indefinitely  vast  area,  and 
with  indefinitely  multiplied  force.  History  is  a  record 
of  the  sentiments  and  actions  of  groups  ;  yet  so 
little  has  this  been  understood,  so  obscured  has  this 


THE  INDIVIDUAL  AND  THE  GROUP  31 

been  by  the  potency  of  personality,  that  until  recently 
it  has  been  little  more  than  an  account  of  individuals. 
Without  the  aid  of  the  group,  what  would  have 
become  of  the  most  famous  heroes  of  the  past  ? 

I  would  sum  up  these  reflections  on  the  relations 
of  the  individ^aTand  the  group  by  the  practical 
deduction  that  to  understand  the  individual  we  must 
study  him  in  relation  to  the  group,  and  to  under- 
stand the  group  we  must  study  it,  primarily  in  the 
individuals  of  which  it  is  composed,  in  both  their 
physical  and  mental  life  ;  and  secondly,  in  those 
principles  and  processes  which  it,  as  an  entirely 
psychical  product,  presents  peculiar  to  itself. 

The  group  is  not  a  *'  natural  "  product  in  the 
objective  sense  in  which  that  word  is  employed  in 
the  term  ''  natural  sciences."  It  is  a  purely  mental 
creation,  thous^h  none  the  less  real.  It  must  be  ex- 
amined  and  investigated  by  other  methods,  therefore, 
than  those  customary  in  the  biologic  sciences. 

Instead  of  studying  external  phenomena  for  their 
own  sake,  we  must  regard  all  such  as  valuable 
only  as  they  Indicate  psychic  changes,  and  as  they 
can  be  translated  into  mental  correlates.  The  study 
is,  therefore,  from  within,  and  qualitative  rather 
than  quantitative,  in  this  respect  contrasting  with 
experimental  psychology  and  also  with  history. 

When  we  examine  in  detail  the  interaction  of  the 


32  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

individual  and  the  group  we  may  classify  the  pro- 
cesses which  take  place  somewhat  as  follows  : 

The  individual  receives  from  the  group  the  sym- 
bols for  complex  and  general  ideas — that  is,  the  words 
of  language  ;  he  is  also  taught  many  complex  pur- 
poseful motions,  such  as  are  needed  in  social  and 
cultured  life ;  he  is  supplied  with  artificial  objects 
for  his  use,  as  tools,  clothing,  shelter,  etc.  ;  and  he  is 
constantly  subjected  to  a  certain  amount  of  physical 
force  from  those  around  him — in  other  words,  is 
"  made  to  do  "  a  variety  of  acts.  The  group  may 
consciously  strive  to  modify  him,  as  in  public  educa- 
tion, religious  instruction,  and  the  like  ;  or  it  may 
act  merely  negatively  in  opposing  any  developments 
antagonistic  to  its  own  character.  The  individual 
may  work  for  or  against  the  group,  or  for  himself 
only  ;  but  in  either  case  has  to  reckon  with  the 
group  for  what  he  obtains  from  it. 

While  the  unity  of  the  ethnic  mind  is  fostered  by 
a  conscious  effort  to  promote  common  interests, 
modes  of  expression,  ambitions,  and  aims,  its  energy 
is  in  direct  proportion  to  the  cultivation  of  the  sense 
of  individuality  among  its  members,  for  from  the 
latter  alone  are  born  the  impulses  to  progress.  The 
fatal  error  of  many  communities  has  been  to  bend 
every  effort  to  secure  the  former,  while  they  neglected 
or  actually  endeavoured  to  suppress  the  latter. 


THE  INDIVIDUAL  AND   THE  GROUP  zz 

I  have  been  using  the  word  "  group  "  In  a  loose 
way.  The  time  has  now  come  to  distinguish  it  from 
various  other  terms  famiHar  to  ethnology,  such  as 
tribe,  folk,  nation,  people,  stock,  and  race. 

**  Group  "  is  the  best  English  equivalent  for  the 
Greek  ethnos,  which  word,  by  its  derivation,  means  a 
number  of  people  united  together  by  habits  and 
usages  in  common. 

This  at  once  places  the  group  above  the  mere 
temporary  aggregations,  such  as  the  crowd  or  the 
mob.  The  ethnic  group  is  formed  by  the  thoughts 
and  aims  of  the  lives  of  its  members,  not  by  their 
ephemeral  emotions  and  actions. 

Compared  with  nation,  stock,  or  race.  It  Is  a  generic 
term  ;  for  by  "  nation  "  we  understand  all  united  In 
the  acceptance  of  one  form  of  government  ;  by 
"  stock,"  those  speaking  dialects  or  tongues  derived 
from  one  primitive  language  (linguistic  stocks)  ;  and 
by  ""  race,"  those  connected  by  identity  of  physical 
traits.  The  "  tribe  "  is  merely  the  primitive  form  of 
the  nation,  while  in  English  ''  folk  "  has  a  current 
application  to  certain  classes  in  society  and  not  to 
the  whole  of  it. 

The  correlative  of  the  ethnic  group,  or,  In  these 
pages,  "  the  group,"  in  German  is  Volk  and  in  French, 
le  peuple. 

How  these  ethnic  groups  are  formed,  under  what 


34  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

complex  conditions  their  differences  arise,  what  in- 
fluences are  the  most  potent  in  their  creation  and 
preservation,  will  be  considered  in  detail  hereafter. 
At  present  it  is  sufficient  to  mention  certain  general 
principles,  applicable  to  the  formation  of  all  ethnic 
groups. 

First,  it  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  mere  similarity 
and  geographical  contiguity  are  not  enough  to  con- 
stitute an  etJinos.  The  Fuegian  hordes  live  under 
the  same  sky,  speak  closely  related  dialects  and  are 
physically  alike  ;  but  no  one  would  pretend  that 
there  is  any  unity  among  them.  Their  roving  bands 
never  meet  but  to  fight  and  their  only  social  occupa- 
tion is  mutual  destruction.  Nor  would  there  be 
any  true  unity  in  a  society  however  peaceful  where 
each  family  isolates  itself  to  the  utmost  from  its 
neighbours  and  seeks  to  limit  all  its  efforts  and  sympa- 
thies to  its  own  members.  Such  a  society  might 
become  high  in  numbers  and  extended  in  area  ;  but 
it  would  have  no  true  unity.  It  might  even  develop 
considerable  results  in  thoughts,  study,  and  invention  ; 
but  they  would  remain  sterile  to  the  general  weal, 
and  contribute  little  or  nothing  to  the  progress  of 
the  race.  Such  was  the  condition  of  parts  of  Europe 
in  the  feudal  ages. 

The  ethnic  life  Is  a  mental  life,  and  this  consists 
not  in  the  sameness  brought  about  by  the  environ- 


THE  INDIVIDUAL  AND   THE  GROUP  35 

ment,  nor  even  In  Ideas  and  acquirements,  but  in 
movement,  comparison,  and  association  of  ideas. 

The    unity    not    merely   of    present    traits    but  of 

future  aims,  not  merely  of  Ideas  but  of  Ideals,  Is  the 

,  true  unity  which  constitutes  the  ethnic  mind.     This 

'  is    the    foundation    fact    which    must    be    constantly 

present  to  the    student,   if   his    researches   in  ethnic 

psychology  are  to  be  profitable. 

In  this  It  differs  from  racial  psychology,  for  while 
doubtless  each  race  has  mental  advantagfes  and  de- 
ficiencles  which  are  Its  own  and  which  largely  decide 
the  destiny  of  its  members,  these  are  not  united  In 
pursuit  of  one  end.  There  is  no  unity  of  will  and 
purpose. 

Each  individual  partakes  of  this  racial  psychology 
as  he  does  of  many  other  mental  unions,  such  as  his 
church  and  his  political  party  ;  but  that  which  has 
pre-eminence  in  history  and  psychology  Is  not  these, 
but  that  closer  and  paramount  union  to  which  he 
is  bound  by  a  common  speech,  Ideas,  motives,  and 
hopes. 

We  must  not  forget,  however,  that  under  what- 
ever connotation  we  understand  the  group,  it  is  still 
composed  of  individuals  ;  and  the  relations  which 
these  bear  to  it  require  careful  consideration. 

The  unity  of  a  group  can  never  be  complete.  The 
infinite  variations  of   Its  Individual  members  prevent 


2,6  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

this.  And  here  comes  in  an  interestlncr  law  which 
has  lately  been  defined  by  an  American  scientist. 
He  has  shown  that  precisely  that  trait  or  those  traits 
which  are  the  most  distinguishing  characteristics  of 
a  group  vary  the  widest  in  the  individuals  of  that 
group. 

Let  us  take,  for  instance,  a  given  community 
remarkable  for  the  average  height  of  its  members. 
We  shall  find  wider  variations  in  this  dimension 
among  them  than  among  a  community  less  con- 
spicuous in  this  measurement. 

This  appears  to  hold  equally  good  for  the  statis- 
tics of  longevity,  of  health  and  disease,  and  other 
physical  traits.  There  is  little  doubt  it  is  also  of 
general  application  to  mental  qualities.  The  contra- 
dictory estimates  of  national  character  largely  de- 
pend upon  it.  Not  the  bias  of  the  observers  but 
their  ignorance  of  the  operation  of  this  law  will  often 
explain  such  discrepancies. 

What  method  should  we  follow  to  avoid  such  an 
error?  In  other  words,  what  formula  can  we  devise 
to  correct  individual  variation  and  arrive  at  a  true 
average  for  the  group  ? 

This  work  has  already  been  done  for  us.  Dili- 
gent students  of  vital  statistics  have  as  good  as 
demonstrated  that  when  a  given  characteristic  of 
a   group    can    be   expressed   in    numbers  and  these 


THE  INDIVIDUAL  AND   THE  GROUP  37 

projected  by  the  graphic  method,  the  resultant  curve 
obtained  will  be  one  of  those  called  by  mathema- 
ticians binomial.  Subtracting  from  the  whole  num- 
ber one-tenth  for  aberrant  forms  or  abnormal  cases 
(the  distribution  of  error),  of  the  remainder,  one- 
half  will  represent  the  mean,  and  one-fourth  each 
will  represent  the  plus  and  minus  extremes.  For 
example,  suppose  in  a  given  community  numbering 
one  thousand  adults  the  average  height  is  5  feet 
6  inches  ;  in  it,  one  hundred  persons  (one-tenth)  will 
be  either  abnormally  tall  or  short  ;  of  the  remainder, 
450  will  attain  just  about  the  total  average  height  ; 
while  225  will  be  above  and  225  below  it.      ^'"^"^ 

We  can  fearlessly  adopt  this  method  of  reasoning 
in  ethnic  psychology.  When  we  speak  of  mental 
traits  or  ideas  common  to  the  group,  we  mean  that 
they  may  be  held  as  expressed  by  scarcely  half  of 
that  group  ;  that  in  the  remainder  of  the  group  they 
may  be  much  more  positively  adopted  or  more  or 
less  rejected  ;  but  inasmuch  as  such  numerous  ex- 
ceptions largely  annul  each  other's  force,  the  general 
tendency  and  action  of  the  group  will  be  guided  by 
the  average  rather  than  by  either  extreme. 

The  justice  of  this  method  is  further  supported  by 
another  general  psychical  law  of  groups.  This  is, 
that  they  attract  in  the  direct  ratio  of  their  mass  ; 
the  more  numerous  a  party  is,  the  more  adherents 


38  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

will  It  obtain.  Hence,  although  in  the  above  ex- 
ample the  mean,  450,  is  less  than  half  of  the  whole 
number,  yet  it  is  much  greater  than  either  of  the 
other  three  sub-groups,  100,  225,  225,  and  exerts  there- 
fore double  the  attractive  power  of  the  latter.  That 
is,  in  a  question  of  opinion,  it  will  receive  twice  as 
many  adherents  as  either  of  the  latter.  Hence  the 
value  of  majorities  as  expressing  the  will  of  a 
community. 

The  principle  of  psychical  action  on  which  the 
above  Is  based  is  one  very  familiar  to  students  of 
psychology.  It  Is  that  termed  '*  collective  sugges- 
tion." This  Is  the  overmastering  tendency  to  Imitate 
the  examples  of  others,  to  act  In  accordance  with  the 
Ideas  and  feelings  which  we  witness  in  those  around 
us.  When  such  Ideas  and  sentiments  are  constant, 
and  conspicuously  displayed,  they  overcome  resist- 
ance and  the  individual  mind  is  attracted  to  that 
of  the  group  with  like  irresistible  magnetism  as  In 
fairy  lore  drew  the  ship  of  the  mariners  to  the  load- 
stone rocks  of  Avalon. 

From  these  considerations  it  will  be  understood 
that  the  group  may  be  regarded  mathematically  as  a 
"constant,"  the  resultant  of  a  number  of  "variables," 
the  individuals  of  whom  it  is  constituted. 

Many  writers  of  late  years  have  spoken  of  the 
social    unit,    the   group    or   the    nation,    as    an    "or- 


THE  INDIVIDUAL  AND   THE  GROUP 


39 


ganlsm."  Some  have  further  defined  it  as  a  "super- 
organism"  or  a  "physio-psychic  organism." 

Such  expressions  are  well  enough  as  figures  of 
speech.  They  serve  to  accentuate  the  interdepend- 
ence of  parts  and  the  potentiality  of  change  and 
development  in  the  ethnic  mind.  But  the  simile 
becomes  illusory  and  deceptive  when  it  is  set  up  as 
a  principle  from  which  to  deduce  conclusions.  The 
group  is  no  more  an  organism  than  is  any  other 
psychical  concept,  that  of  the  "genus  Homo"  for 
example. 

A  vital  characteristic  of  the  ethnic  group  is  the 
degree  of  its  centralisation.  This  is,  in  truth,  a  co- 
efficient of  its  powers.  Numbers  may  be  said  to 
increase  thus  by  addition,  but  centralisation  by  multi- 
plication. The  centralisation,  however,  must  be 
real ;  not  simply  a  single  point  of  action,  but  also  a 
convergence  of  forces  to  that  point.  The  French 
nation  is  popularly  supposed  to  be  centralised  in 
Paris  ;  but  in  fact  the  provinces  are  usually  ignorant 
of  national  action  there  until  after  it  has  occurred. 
It  is  through  modern  methods  of  rapid  transmission 
of  intelligence  that  national  groups  can  act  with  so 
much  greater  force  than  in  earlier  days. 

The  pernianerice  of  the  ethnic  group  has  been  a 
matter  much  discussed  by  philosophers.  Led  on  by 
a  supposed   analogy  to  the   individual,  governed   by 


40  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

the  notion  that  the  social  unit  is  an  *'orofanism"  and 
subject  to  the  same  laws  as  physical  organisms,  sup- 
ported, as  they  imagined,  by  the  teachings  of  history, 
writers  of  merit  have  claimed  that  the  ethnos  has  a 
birth,  an  adolescence,  a  period  of  maturity,  and  old 
age  and  death,  as  has  the  individual. 

Even  such  an  acute  thinker  as  Ouetelet  was  so 
enamoured  of  this  theory  that  he  worked  out  the 
**  natural  longevity  "of  a  nation,  discovering  it  to  be 
about  ten  times  the  greatest  longevity  of  its  individual 
members  ! 

The  doctrines  of  ethnic  psychology,  as  I  under- 
stand them,  do  not  sanction  such  an  opinion.  The 
analogy  of  the  group  to  an  organism  is  purely  ficti- 
tious ;  the  historic  causes  of  the  decay  of  nations  are 
not  the  same  and  are  not  allied  to  those  which  bring 
about  mortality  in  the  individual. 

There  is  no  such  thing  as  a  natural  death  of  a 
Society.  It  may  be  crushed  by  external  force,  but  if 
it  perishes  from  within,  it  has  deliberately  poisoned 
itself,  has  fallen  a  victim  to  preventable  disease. 

There  is  one  catholicon,  one  elixir  of  life,  which 
will  preserve  any  society  from  decay,  and  confer  upon 
it  the  blessing  of  eternal  youth,  if  it  is  constantly 
remembered  and  administered. 

That  catholicon  is  to  cherish  and  cultivate  assidu- 
ously the  one  distinction  which,  I  have  pointed  out, 


THE  INDIVIDUAL  AND   THE  GROUP  41 

lifts  the  human  group  above  the  communities  of  the 
ants,  the  bees,  and  the  beavers ;  that  is,  that  the  chief 
aim  of  the  community  shall  ever  be  to  give  each  in- 
dividual in  it  the  best  opportunity  for  the  full  de- 
velopment of  his  faculties. 

If  the  history  of  the  gradual  decline  and  fall  of  any 
nation  be  investigated,  it  will  be  seen  that  the  end 
has  come  through  the  violation  of  this,  the  one  pecul- 
iar principle  of  human  association.  Hemmed  in  by 
castes,  classes,  or  institutions,  the  human  souls  have 
atrophied,  degenerated,  grown  decrepit  and  impotent, 
incapable  of  resisting  the  natural  forces  around  them. 

Though  the  ethnic  mind  does  not  run  the  same 
life-course  as  the  individual  body,  yet  it  resembles 
this  in  its  ceaseless  chancre.  It  is  forever  alterinof 
both  its  contents,  its  purposes,  and  the  intensity  with 
which  it  pursues  them. 

Psychologists  have  classified  these  activities  under 
three  general  expressions  which  we  may  call  laws. 
They  are,  first,  the  law  of  Continuity  ;  second,  the  law 
of  Diversity  of  Purpose  ;  and  third,  the  law  of  Contrast. 

The  law  of  Continuity  means  that  in  the  ethnic  men- 
tal life  there  is  a  reo^ulated  course  of  orrowth  or  de- 
velopment  ;  that  each  phase  or  condition  is  the  logical 
result  of  previous  phases  or  conditions. 

The  second  law  emphasises  that  the  rate  of  growth 
depends  chiefly  on  the  diversity  of  aims  which  exists 


42  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

In  the  community.  As  they  are  muhipHed,  growth  is 
the  more  rapid.  This  is  analogous  to  that  law  of 
organic  forms  by  which  evolution  is  in  proportion  to 
variation. 

The  third  law,  that  of  Contrast,  applies  to  the 
ethnic  mind  the  curious  fact  in  mental  life  that  a  pro- 
longed devotion  to  one  idea  leads  to  a  reaction  in 
which  the  opposite  of  that  idea  becomes  dominant. 
This  is  even  more  conspicuous  in  the  history  of  pro- 
gressive nations  than  in  that  of  individuals.  Upon 
this  depends  that  periodicity  in  the  lives  of  peoples 
which  has  so  often  been  remarked  by  historians. 

The  above-mentioned  facts  and  laws  demonstrate 
that  there  is  a  true  unity  of  existence  In  the  ethnic 
mind  ;  that  it  has  its  own  traits,  forms,  and  processes 
of  growth  and  decay,  quite  apart  from  those  of  the 
individual  mind ;  that  it  Is  not  to  be  studied  by  the 
methods  of  experimental  psychology,  but  by  methods 
drawn  from  the  observation  of  Its  own  modes  of 
being ;  and  that  It  Is  this  abstraction.  If  you  please, 
which  is  the  prime  factor  in  the  fate  of  the  group 
over  which  it  rules. 

But  I  must  return  again  to  the  definition  of  the 
Group.  It  must  not  be  said  that  I  leave  any  ob- 
scurity in  the  connotation  of  that  prominent  word. 

There  may  be — there  always  are — many  forms  of 
groups    in   the   same   community,   and  these  by  no 


THE  INDIVIDUAL  AND   THE  GROUP  43 

means  cover  each  other  cotermlnously.  Take  many 
an  American  village,  for  example.  There  are  the 
religious  groups,  Protestant  and  Catholic  ;  the  polit- 
ical parties,  Republicans  and  Democrats,  not  at  all  of 
the  same  individuals  as  the  former ;  and  there  may 
be  the  linguistic  groups,  German  and  American, 
different  again  from  both  the  former ;  and  the  racial 
groups,  whites  and  negroes. 

Something  similar  to  this  is  found  on  a  large 
scale  in  every  people,  every  nation  ;  and  the  serious 
problem  presents  itself, — how  are  we,  from  these 
heterogeneous  elements,  to  reach  anything  which  we 
can  properly  call  the  common  sentiment,  the  general 
mjnd  of  the  mass  ? 

The  example  I  have  chosen  of  the  American  vil- 
lage is  an  extreme  one.  In  a  primitive,  isolated 
tribe  of  Indians,  in  a  remote  mountain  village,  or  a 
rarely  visited  island,  the  task  would  be  vastly  easier. 
But  the  principle  in  all  cases  is  the  same. 

By  eliminating  particular  after  particular,  as  the 
logicians  say,  we  finally  reach  a  general,  a  consensus 
of  opinion  and  aspiration  on  a  variety  of  topics,  with 
which  the  full  number  required  by  the  mathematical 
method  already  stated  will  agree.  These  common 
sentiments  will  represent  the  active  influence  of  that 
community,  and  very  accurately  measure  its  value  in 
development. 


44  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

Being  an  American  village,  we  can  without  doubt 
predict  that  it  will  be  of  one  mind  that  making  money 
should  be  the  chief  aim  of  active  exertion  ;  that  respect 
for  the  law  of  the  land  should  be  cultivated  ;  and  that 
performing  recognised  duties  to  one's  family  should 
be  taught  as  indispensable. 

One  must  not  take  it  for  granted,  however,  that 
such  like  salient  features  are  necessarily  the  ones 
which  govern  and  measure  the  powers  and  actions  of 
the  group.  Such  an  error  is  very  common.  The 
chief  trait  of  the  Scot  is  popularly  supposed  to  be 
his  stinginess ;  but  the  solid  and  lasting  character 
of  that  people  prove  that  they  have  souls  above 
lucre.  The  English  are  pre-eminently  mercantile, 
and  Napoleon  called  them  a  nation  of  shopkeepers, 
but  he  discovered  his  mistake  at  Waterloo ;  the 
apostle  called  the  Cretans  "liars  and  slow  bellies," 
but  Crete  was  the  source  of  Greek  law,  and  when 
the  apostle  elsewhere  quoted  a  Gentile  poet's  con- 
cept of  God  as  his  own,  that  poet  was  a  Cretan. 

How,  then,  it  will  be  asked,  are  we  to  distinguish 
the  most  vital  from  the  most  prominent  traits  of  the 
ethnic  mind,  since  they  are  not  always,  even  not 
often,  the  same  ? 

(The  answer  to  that  question  is  the  main  object 
of  the  second  part  of  the  present  volume.  Suffice  it, 
therefore,  here  to  say  that  all  ethnic  traits  must  be 


THE  INDIVIDUAL  AND   THE  GROUP  45 

weighed  and  measured  by  the  contributions  they 
make  to  the  cultural  history  of  mankind,  to  the  real- 
isation in  daily  life  of  those  ideas  which  are  the  form- 
ative elements  in  civilisation. 

Reverting  once  more  to  the  definition  of  the  group 
as  portrayed  in  the  ethnic  mind,  Its  traits  are  further 
brought  into  relief  by  the  comparison  of  group  with 
group. 

The  individuals  are  here  dropped  from  sight,  and 
the  elements  and  processes  of  two  or  more  ethnic 
minds  are  placed  In  contrast.  They  are  compared 
in  the  manner  In  which  they  have  conceived  and  car- 
ried out  notions  common  to  the  species — let  us  say 
religion,  or  law,  or  social  relations,  or  practical  In- 
ventions. When  the  comparison  Is  extended  to  all 
the  cultural  elements  and  the  results  tabulated,  we 
reach  fixed  and  accurate  data  for  appraising  ethnic 
mental  ability,  whether  racial,  tribal,  or  national. 

There  is  nothlnor  delusive  or  fanciful  In  such  com- 

o 

parisons.  The  results  are  obtained  by  recognised 
scientific  methods,  and  are  controlled  by  well-known 
mathematical  laws.  They  establish  the  claims  of 
ethnic  psychology  to  a  place  among  the  exact  sciences, 
and  show  that  it  has  a  field  of  Its  own  not  yet  in- 
cluded in  the  domain  of  any  of  its  neighbours. 


r''^ 


CHAPTER  III 

PHYSIOLOGICAL   VARIA  TION  IN  THE 
ETHNIC  MIND 

T^HUS  furnished,  as  we  have  seen  in  the  last  chap- 
ter, with  a  common  stock  of  faculties  and  de- 
sires, the  primitive  men  set  out  from  their  unknown 
birthplace,  to  conquer  the  world.  They  journeyed 
east,  north,  south,  and  west,  into  foreign  fields  and 
under  alien  skies.  Seized  in  the  iron  grasp  of  novel 
environment,  each  band  must  adapt  itself  to  the  new 
conditions  or  perish ;  for  in  their  ignorance  they 
knew  not  to  wrest  the  power  from  Nature  and  make 
her  their  slave.  They  must  bow  and  yield  to  her 
commands  under  penalty  of  death. 

Compelled  by  external  forces,  they  changed  the 
hue  of  their  skin  and  the  shade  of  their  hair ;  they 
grew  tall  of  stature  or  sank  to  pygmies ;  their  skulls 
altered  in  shape,  and  their  long  bones  rounded,  or 
else  flattened  like  those  of  apes. 

Not  less   surprising  were  the    alterations  in  their 

46 


PHYSIOLOGICAL   VARIATION  47 

minds.  Some  felt  no  desire  for  fixed  abodes,  and 
ever  wandered,  while  others  sowed  fields  and  built 
cities ;  some  remained  in  small,  ungoverned  bands, 
while  others  founded  great  empires  and  enacted 
iron  codes;  some  Avere  satisfied  to  compel  the  Un- 
known by  magical  rites,  while  others  sought  the 
wisdom  of  God  and  the  secrets  of  Nature. 

These  variations,  however,  meant  Progress ;  for 
repetition  is  not  progress,  and  it  is  only  by  cease- 
less change  and  endless  experiment  that  one  can  find 
out  the  best.  The  separation  of  man  into  families 
and  tribes  and  peoples  was,  in  fact,  a  necessary  con- 
dition to  his  improvement  as  a  species.  From  the 
seeming  chaos  of  changing  forms  the  highest  type 
emerged,  as,  in  Greek  myth,  from  the  surging  seas 
rose    the    perfect   form  of    Aphrodite    Anadyomene. 

The  chaos  is  indeed  but  seeming.  The  differ- 
ences  among  men  are  the  results  of  physiological 
processes,  proceeding  in  definite  directions  under 
fixed  laws,  and  adjusted  so  that  they  bring  about 
calculable  results.  Let  us  turn  to  the  examination 
of  these  processes,  in  their  universal  expressions 
operative  everywhere,  as  well  in  the  psychical  as  the 
physical  world. 

Psychical  as  well  as  physical  ;  for  the  new  con- 
ditions which  transformed  the  bodies  of  the  primitive 
horde    left  their    impress  also    on  the    minds   of    its 


48  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

members,  not  erasing  any  trait  which  made  them 
Man,  but  bringing  them  into  closer  Hkeness  between 
themselves,  and  by  that  act  into  sharper  contrast  to 
their  neighbours.  The  varied  practical  needs  of  life 
fostered  their  peculiarities,  and  created  a  similarity 
of  feelings  and  purposes,  and  a  community  of  know- 
ledo^e  in  each  band.  This  acted  as  a  sort  of  intel- 
lectual  motherwater  in  which  each  individual  mind 
of  the  band  crystallised  into  the  same  shape,  readily 
accepted  the  beliefs,  imbibed  the  same  prejudices, 
looked  at  the  world  through  the  same  spectacles. 
We  may  well  believe  that  it  was  not  long  before 
contests  arose  between  the  primitive  hordes.  We 
are  told,  indeed,  by  a  venerable  authority  that  they 
beean  between  the  first  two  brothers.  Then  these 
diversities  of  body  and  mind  decided  the  conflict. 
The  stroneer  slew  the  weaker  or  drove  them  from 
the  field  ;  unless,  indeed,  by  craft  or  superior  skill 
the  weaker  foiled  the  stronger,  as,  so  endowed,  in  the 
long  run  they  surely  would.  J  Thus  the  great  law  of 
Natural  Selection,  of  the  destruction  of  the  less  fit, 


exercised  its  sway  to  preserve  that  horde  which,  on 
the  whole,  was  better  adapted  for  preservation  and 
gave  itpower  over  the  land. 

In  the  species  Man  the  exemplification  of  this 
great  law  is,  as  I  have  intimated,  essentially  psychi- 
cal, and  its  application  is  upon  masses,  upon  ethnic 


PHYSIOLOGICAL   VARIATION  49 

groups.  History,  the  story  of  man's  progress,  deals 
only  with  these,  not  with  individuals. 

Progressive  ethnic  mental  variation  is  therefore 
the  theme  for  our  immediate  consideration,  and 
especially  as  it  is  displayed  in  the  processes  of  nat- 
ural  selection  and  adaptation.  This  is  the  physio- 
logy  of  ethnic  psychology,  the  history  of  its  normal 
progress  to  more  specialised  powers  and  higher 
U^pes._ 

I  cannot  go  amiss  if  I  present  it  with  a  rather 
close  adherence  to  the  recognised  method  of  natural 
science ;  for  the  impression  is  constantly  gaining 
ground  that  the  psychical  life  of  Man  follows  the 
same  laws  as  does  his  physical ;  or,  to  express  the 
thought  more  accurately,  that  the  one  is  the  reflex 
of  the  other,  for  we  can  read  both  with  equal  correct- 
ness in  terms  of  thought  or  terms  of  extension. 

Such  changes  may  take  place  in  several  directions : 
as  in  abolishing  organs  no  longer  useful  ;  in  reducing 
others  which  are  diminishing  in  value  ;  in  strength- 
ening  those  which  are  of  immediate  utility ;  and,  by- 
correlation,  maintaining  those  relations  of  parts  on 
which  the  "type"  depends. 

These  changes  are  not  "purposive";  they  do  not 
aim  toward  a  future  type,  though  they  may  result  in 
one.  Such  a  type  may  be  more  decadent  than  its 
antecedent,  and  be  the  prelude  to  extinction,  under 


50  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

this  adamantine  law  of  destruction  ;  but  if  its  varia- 
tions have  been  physiological  and  adaptive,  they  will 
confer  upon  it  the  blessing  of  life,  the  gift  of  length 
of  days. 

/  Those  changes  which  strengthen  an  organ  or 
structure,  or  tend  to  develop  and  preserve  new  and 
useful  variations  are  called  "  progressive " ;  those 
which  tend  to  draw  individual  variation  back  to  the 
current  type  or  to  reduce  certain  structures  or  func- 
tions are  called  "  reo^ressive  "  variations. 

It  would  seem  at  first  sight  that  such  processes 
must  tend  in  opposite  directions — the  one  beneficial, 
the  other  injurious.  In  fact,  both  are  preservative  ; 
but  by  contrasted  physiological  processes. 

Progressive  changes  begin   in   the  individual  and 


pass  by  inheritance  into  the  stock,  when  they  have 
proved  beneficial  to  it.  They  continue  in  action  so 
long  as  they  are  useful.  When  their  utility  ceases, 
the  energy  of  the  economy  is  expended  elsewhere,  on 
other  structures  or  faculties.  The  defeneration  thus 
produced  is  ''compensatory."  It  does  not  detract 
fj-om  but  adds  to  the  general  viability  of  the 
organism. 

What  is  most  marvellous  In  this  process  Is  that  the 
part  or  power  rarely  wholly  disappears,  no  matter 
how  lOng  it  has  been  useless.  The  pineal  gland  in 
the  human  brain  is  the  remains  of  a  third  eye  with 


PHYSIOLOGICAL    VARIATION  51 

which  our  ancestors  looked  out  from  the  top  of  their 
heads  when  they  were  Silurian  fishes  ;  and  the  ap- 
pendix vermiformis  was  an  annex  to  their  stomachs 
when  they  were  herbaceous  ruminants  ! 

So  it  is  in  psychical  anthropology.  A  department 
of  it,  Folklore,  is  taken  up  with  such  survivals,  and 
strange  are  its  revelations  !  Our  Christmas  dinner  is 
a  reminiscence  of  ^  cannibal  feast  at  the  winter 
solstice.  The  dyed  Easter  ^^'g  is  a  relic  of  a  myth 
of  the  dawn  older  than  the  Pyramids. 
[  In  strictly  scientific  language  evolution  is  not 
always  synonymdus^With  progress.  It  means  simply 
change  or  transformation  within  the  limits  of  physio- 
logical laws — that  is,  that  such  changes  tend,  on  the 
whole,  to  the  preservation  of  the  individual  or  do 
not  conflict  with  it. 

Life  is  the  criterion  of  evolution.  But  the  applica- 
tion of  this  standard  is  not  always  easy.  The  most 
salient  variation  is  not  necessarily  the  most  im- 
portant. Again,  a  variation  admirably  suited  to  a 
given  mode  of  existence  may  be  unfriendly  to  de- 
velopment by  unfitting  the  stock  for  later  and  in- 
evitable changes  of  environment. 

In  the  psychical  ethnic  life  there  are,  however,  a 
limited  number  of  characteristics,  the  symmetrical  de- 
velopment of  which  cannot  fail  to  bring  out  all  the 
latent  powers  of  the  group    in   the  struggle   for   its 


52  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

independent  existence  ;  and,  conversely,  their  neglect 
or  faulty  cultivation  will  surely  pave  the  way  to 
debility  and  disappearanre/  Thpy  are  the  primary 
factors  of  progressive  variation  in  ethnic  psychology. 


The  list  of  them  is  as  follows  : 

I  — Remembrance. 

2 — Industry. 

3 — I  nventiveness. 

4 — Adaptability. 

5 — Receptiveness. 

6 — Forethought. 
They  are  all  essential  to  ethnic  progress  ;  though 
the  special  cultivation  of  one  or  the  other  must  be 
dictated  by  the  circumstances.  The  development 
must  be  in  relation  to  the  inner  (mental)  and  outer 
(physical)  demands  upon  the  group,  if  it  is  to  make  the 
best  of  its  life.  They  are  the  physiological  elements 
of  collective  mental  growth,  standing  in  relation  to  it 
as  do  proper  food,  exercise,  cleanliness,  and  the  other 
hygienic  methods  to  bodily  health  and  strength. 

T.  Remefnbrance. — Knowledge  is  of  no  avail  uo- 
less  it  is  remembered.  Experience  may  become  pro- 
phetic, but  if  its  words  are  forgotten,  of  what  use  is  its 
wisdom?  Hence  the  rudest  savaofes  seek  means  to 
strengthen  their  recollection  of  events  and  ideas. 
The  Australian  has  his  message  stick,  the  Peruvian 
his  knotted  string  {quipii),  the  Chippeway  his  meday 


PHYSIOLOGICAL  VARIATION  53 

club, — all  to    help   preserve   tradition,    ritual,    know- 
ledge, in  some  form. 

Whatever  technical  process  was  devised  to  shape 
a  war  club,  or  to  minister  to  the  sense  of  beauty  by 
adornment,  whatever  laws  were  framed  to  regulate 
the  clan,  whatever  secrets  were  learned  from  nature, 
became  of  value  to  the  group  only  in  so  far  as  the 
faculty  of  memory  and  the  means  of  remembrance 
were  cultivated. 

I  need  not  refer  to  the  supreme  treasure  of  written 
records,  the  national  literatures  of  the  world  ;  but  it 
is  worth  noting  that  just  to  the  extent  that  a  nation 
cherishes  its  own  history,  lives  in  its  past  deeds, 
drinks  from  its  own  fonts  of  thought,  does  it  develop 
its  vitality  and  independence. 

Tradition  and  instruction  in  what  the  group  has 
already  gained  is  the  first  condition  of  further  ad- 
vance. If  the  future  is  to  rest  on  a  secure  founda- 
tion, it  must  be  built  on  the  experience  of  the  past. 
Plato  estimated  the  alphabet  none  too  highly  when 
he  called  it  a  gift  of  the  gods.  The  dream  of  im- 
mortality in  name  is  a  mighty  stimulus  to  effort. 
What  were  that  fame  worth  that  perished  with  our 
flesh? 

Under  this  head  also  comes  what  we  broadly  call 
Education,  that  which  distributes  to  the  newgeneration_ 
the  garnered  grain  and  treasured  pearls  of  hundreds 


54  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

of  older  generations  ;  which  places  in  the  hands  of 
the  young  the  tools  of  thought,  the  training  in  voca- 
tions, the  pride  in  the  noble  achievements  of  the 
past,  the  acquaintance  with  their  own  powers  and 
the  means  of  increasing  them,  the  precepts  of  justice, 
of  love,  and  of  truth,  and  the  inspiration  of  grand 
ideals  of  life  and  work. 

No  past  is  too  remote  to  be  destitute  of  practical 
value  to  the  present.  No  truth  is  too  trivial  to  be 
regarded.  Knowledge  has  long  and  wisely  been 
esteemed  the  synonym  of  power.  Art,  science,  the 
whole  fabric  of  culture,  are  accumulations,  memories, 
of  millenniums  of  labour,  of  whose  results  all  has  been 
lost  except  that  which  has  been  recollected. 

2.  Industry. — The  secret  of  all  improvement  in 
human  life  is  the  conscious  effort  to  improve.  Idle- 
ness is  the  chief  obstacle  to  advancement..  Disuse 
of  brain-function  degenerates  the  tissues  faster  than 
misuse.  Labour,  work,  activity,  exercise, — these  are 
the  only  means  to  strengthen  the  powers  we  have  and 
insure  their  survival. 

Not  all  effort  is  equally  beneficial.  It  may  be 
honestly  intended,  but  misdirected,  and  lead  to  perdi- 
tion ;  it  may  be  the  tread-mill  labour  which  reduces 
the  man  to  a  machine,  and  blunts  and  dulls  his  soul  ; 
it  may  be,  as  with  those  who  "  work  hard  at  play," 
consumed  in  frivolous  pastimes  and  trivial  objects. 


PHYSIOLOGICAL   VARIATION  55 

The  true  aim  of  all  effort,  that  aim  which  most 
contributes  to  progress,  Is  the  conquest  of  the 
environment,  the  subjection  of  it  to  the  enlightened 
reason  and  the  individual  will.  "  The  one  process 
of  human  evolution,"  says  a  thoughtful  writer,  "  is 
the  passage  from  a  merely  mechanical  to  a  rational 
life." 

"  Adaptation  to  environment "  belongs  to  plant  life 
and  brute  life.  Man  at  his  best  aims  at  the  nobler 
task  of  moulding  the  environment  to  his  own  will 
and  wishes.  He  is  not  its  slave,  but  its  master. 
Does  arctic  cold  threaten  to  freeze  the  blood  in  his 
veins  ?  He  builds  a  hut  and  lights  a  lamp  ;  and  the 
summer  zephyr  is  not  milder  than  the  air  he  breathes. 
Does  the  equatorial  sun  dart  Its  fatal  rays  from  the 
zenith  ?  He  spreads  an  umbrella  and  dons  a  helmet, 
and  is  as  cool  as  if  under  orchard  shades  of  temper- 
ate zones. 

Reason-directed,  unflagging  activity, — this  is  the 
one  indispensable  and  all-sufficient  security  for  the  in- 
definite progress  of  Individual  or  group.  The 
definition  of  "  genius,"  said  Goethe,  "  is  the  willing- 
ness to  labour  unremittingly."  The  willingness  pre- 
supposes the  will,  and  he  of  the  indomitable  will 
soon  becomes  master  of  his  purpose. 

This  trait  has  lonor  been  familiar  as  a  criterion  in 
ethnic  psychology.      Professor  Klemm  In  his  history 


56  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

of  human  culture,  written  half  a  century  ago,  di- 
vided the  tribes  and  nations  of  humanity  into  those 
who  have  been  **  passive"  and  those  who  have  been 
*'  active."  He  maintained  that  the  love  of  labour  is 
the  simple  and  sufficient  measure  for  the  capacities  of 
any  race. 

Many  later  writers  have  followed  him  in  this  dis- 
crimination, although  they  phrase  it  in  various  forms. 
The  latest,  Professor  Vierkandt,  repeats  it  in  a  more 
psychological  guise  when  he  states  that  the  real 
source  and  centre  of  all  differences  between  the  cult-, 
ures  of  human  groups  is  the  one  difference  between 
their  voluntary  and  involuntary  activities.  The  lat- 
ter are  instinctive,  the  former  reflective;  the  latter 
are  mechanical,  the  former  are  rational ;  the  latter  are 
of  bondage,  the  former  of  freedom. 

The  sum  of  average  brain-industry  in  an  ethnic 
mind  is  the  measure  of  its  comparative  value.  Not 
single  brilliant  examples  of  genius,  cases  here  and 
there  of  exceptional  ability,  but  a  prevailing  love 
of  labour  is  what  guarantees  success.  A  true  genius, 
a  Camoens  or  a  Cervantes,  belongs  more  to  the  world 
than  to  the  nation.  Both  these  illustrious  names 
have  stimulated  thought  more  in  foreign  lands  than 
in  their  own  homes. 

3.  Inve7ttiveness. — When  the  neolithic  man  in- 
vented a  sword  of  bronze  to  replace  his  dagger  of 


PHYSIOLOGICAL   VARIATION  57 

stone,  he  invested  his  tribe  with  the  kingship  of  the 
known  world.  The  less-inventive  hordes  became 
their  slaves. 

The  victory  of  man  over  nature  has  been  won  by 
his  inventions  ;  and  the  tribe,  group,  or  nation  which 
leads  in  the  control  of  natural  forces  will  also  lead  in 
the  struggle  for  existence,  and  supremacy.  Others 
may  sing  sweeter  songs  or  dream  diviner  visions,  but 
the  potency  of  life  will  not  be  won  thereby. 

Inventiveness  is  another  word  for  that  knowledge 
which  is  really  power,  force,  strength — brutal,  if  you 
will,  but  present,  actual. 

Man  is  distinctively  a  tool-using  animal,  and  those 
with  the  most  efficient  tools  will  bring  the  others  to 
terms  ;  for  when  it  is  a  tool  of  war,  a  weapon,  victory 
is  to  him  who  has  the  best. 

Inventiveness  is  the  foe  of  habit,  and  habit  is  the 
foe  to  advancement.  As  the  sickle  gave  way  to  the 
scythe,  and  the  scythe  to  the  mowing-machine, 
the  food-supply  was  insured  against  failure,  famines 
disappeared,  and  aggregations  of  millions  in  cities 
became  possible. 

An  invention  is  something  concrete,  objective.  It 
substitutes  reality  for  a  dream,  and  in  the  end  sur- 
passes, in  the  elements  of  the  marvellous,  all  dreams. 
The  Arabian  Nights  tell  of  no  magic  spell  so  potent 
as  to  enable  persons  to  speak  to  each  other  a  thousand 


58  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

miles  apart.  But  invention  has  made  that  the  most 
commonplace  of  incidents. 

As  there  is  no  calculable  limit  to  the  natural  forces, 
so  there  is  none  to  our  possible  control  of  them. 
Reason  has  this  in  itself,  that  qualitatively  it  is  of 
higher  order  than  force  and  can  control  it  to  any 
extent.  The  nation  which  constantly  encourages  this 
application  of  reason  must  be  the  most  forcible, 
the  most  powerful.  Would  you  forecast  the  fate  of 
the  present  "  great  powers  "  in  the  twentieth  century  ? 
The  books  of  prophecy  are  open.  They  are  the 
records  of  the  patent  offices. 

4.  Adaptability, — The  fundamental  law  of  life  in 
organic  forms  is  their  relative  ability  to  adapt  them- 
selves to  environments. 

This  is  just  as  true  of  ethnic  units,  physically  and 
mentally.  When  I  come  to  speak  of  acclimatisation, 
I  shall  dwell  on  the  former  phase  ;  now,  I  emphasise 
the  necessity  of  mental  adaptation,  as  shown  in  laws, 
religions,  customs,  and  thoughts. 

There  must  be  nothing  "  hide-bound  "  in  the  tribe 
or  nation  which  migrates  or  which  expands  into  new 
conditions  of  life.  Home-sickness  must  be  unknown 
to  it.  It  must  cherish  no  ancient  local  prejudices, 
carry  with  it  no  baggage  which  it  is  not  ready  to  ex- 
change for  something  more  suitable.  More  than  that, 
it  must  be  on  the  alert  to  discover  what  alterations  in 


PHYSIOLOGICAL   VARIATION  59 

home  habits  should  be  made,  and  hasten  to  make 
them. 

Adaptability  is  not  the  loss  of  national  character. 
We  may  change  our  sky  with  profit,  but  keep  our 
minds.  To  lose  ourselves  in  travelling  would  be  a 
loss  irreparable.  The  human  group  which  succumbs 
to  new  environment  does  not  adapt  itself  to  it,  but  is 
drowned  in  it.  The  changes  required  by  adaptability 
are  chiefly  external  and  of  will.  They  are  such  as  the 
recognition  of  new  experiences  suggests  as  advisable 
for  survival. 

Adaptability  is  an  active  trait.  To  be  most  effective 
It  must  be  conscious  and  purposive.  The  know- 
ledge gained  from  others  must  be  utilised  intention- 
ally to  the  special  advantage  of  the  group.  In  this 
form  it  Is  a  product  of  the  higher  culture.  Primitive 
peoples,  when  they  migrated,  submitted  themselves 
without  reflection  to  the  new  Influences  around  them  ; 
enlightened  groups  are  on  their  guard  and  sedulously 
retain  what  they  bring  with  them  if  they  see  it  Is  bet- 
ter than  what  they  find,  or  accept  the  latter  If  It  Is 
superior.  True  adaptability,  therefore,  is  the  result 
of  conscious  reasoning. 

5.  Receptiveness. — Not  only  should  the  ethnic  mind 
be  ready  to  adapt  Itself  to  changed  conditions,  but 
it  should  be  ever  ready  to  give  admittance  to  new 
knowledge  ;  not   only  passively,  but  should  actively 


6o  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

seek  it  from  others.  Only  thus  can  it  progress  surely 
and  rapidly.  Anything  in  the  nature  of  '*  Chauvin- 
ism "  is  destructive  to  breadth  of  conception.  The 
national  egotism  which  scorns  to  learn  of  neighbours 
prepares  the  pathway  to  national  ruin. 

Primitive  tribes  borrowed  extensively  one  from  the 
other.  The  traditions,  games,  arts,  and  Inventions 
were  appropriated  by  the  most  mentally  energetic, 
and  by  them  such  secured  dominion  and  prosperity. 

Civilisation  alters  not  this  process.  That  nation 
to-day  which  is  most  eager  to  learn  from  others, 
which  is  furthest  from  the  fatal  delusion  that  all  wis- 
dom flows  from  its  own  springs,  will  surely  be  in  the 
van  of  progress. 

-Receptiveness  in  national  life  is  gauged  by  the 
knowledge  the  nation  has  of  others.  This  can  be 
gained  by  intelligent  travel  or  by  study.  Where  the 
citizens  of  a  country  travel  little  or  for  amusement 
only,  and  are  but  slightly  conversant  with  other 
languages  than  their  own,  we  may  be  sure  that  the 
national  mind  is  lacking  in  this  quality.  The  num- 
ber of  foreign  students  in  a  great  university  is  a  test 
of  this  element  of  progress  in  the  character  of  their 
respective  nationalities. 

Hence  the  practical  deduction  of  the  importance  of 
a  knowledge  of  modern  languages.  Without  them, 
the  minds  of  other  nations  are  closed  books  to  us. 


PHYSIOLOGICAL  VARIATION  6i 

They  may  be  surpassing  us  in  wisdom  and  we  be 
ignorant  of  it.  In  that  case,  some  day  we  or  our 
children  will  weep  for  our  negligence. 

6.  ForetJiougJit. — In  one  of  his  works  Professor 
Letourneau  remarks  that  forethought  is  par  excellence 
the  ripe  fruit  of  intellectual  development.  The  ancient 
Greeks  embodied  this  truth  in  the  pregnant  myth  of 
Prometheus  (Forethought),  who  stole  fire  from  the 
gods  and  gave  it  unto  men  and  his  brother  Epimetheus 
(Afterthought). 

He  who  is  willing  to  sacrifice  the  present  for  the 
future  must  possess  self-control,  fixity  of  purpose, 
faith  in  what  governs  the  future,  decision  of  character. 
His  actions  must  be  conscious,  purposive,  directed  by 
intelligence.  His  will  must  be  trained  in  the  choice 
of  motive,  and  his  passions  curbed  into  obedience  to 
his  reason.  Self-restraint,  self-sacrifice,  even  self- 
immolation,  are  the  virtues  he  must  be  ready  to 
practise. 

The  distant  aim  for  which  he  is  thus  denying  him- 
self may  be  within  the  confines  of  his  own  expecta- 
tion of  life,  and  thus  be  after  all  centred  in  personal 
ambitions  ;  or  it  may  be  directed  toward  some  hoped- 
for  life  hereafter,  in  the  next  world,  the  spirit-land  ; 
or,  noblest  of  all,  it  may  be  in  the  interest  of  unborn 
generations  and  humanity  at  large.  Perhaps  in  his 
zeal   he   misses    present    joys   for  the   illusions   of    a 


62  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

fancied  future  ;  but  better  this  than  to  sacrifice  the 
future  to  the  present. 

In  such  cleHberate  and  conscious  planning  for  re- 
mote aims  he  is  not  Hke  the  squirrel  who  lays  up  a 
store  of  nuts  for  the  winter  ;  for  the  man  exercises 
his  will  and  decides  between  motives,  and  his  actions 
are  not  controlled  by  external  events  but  by  inner, 
psychical  reflections.  There  is  even  something  not 
despicable  in  that  avarice  which  heaps  up  riches  and 
knows  not  who  shall  enjoy  them.  In  it  is  revealed 
that  anxiety  to  labour  for  a  remote  future,  at  present 
sacrifice,  which,  in  nobler  expressions,  is  a  fine, 
essentially  human,  trait. 

Thjs_xharacteristic  differs  widely  In  mankind,  and 
Jn  Indivlduak.  So  significant  Is  it  of  the  progress  of 
the  group  that  In  various  forms  It  has  been  chosen 
by  several  writers  as  the  main  distinction  between 
savagery  and  civilisation.  The  efforts  of  the  bar- 
barian aim  at  the  satisfaction  of  his  Immediate  wants 
only.  His  means  of  livelihood — hunting,  fishing,  and 
^he  collection  of  natural  products — do  not  admit  of 
saving;  for  a  far-off  future.  As  the  soul  rises  in 
culture,  Its  horizon  expands.  Not  merely  against 
winter's  want,  but  against  the  Inevitable  periods  of 
sickness  and  decrepitude  which  lie  In  wait  for  all, 
must  we  be  prepared.  Then  there  are  the  feeble 
and   the  helpless,  and  farther  still  the  unborn,   our 


PHYSIOLOGICAL   VARIATION  63 

descendants,  for  whom  we  feel  responsible.  Finally, 
the  horizon  falls  co-equal  with  the  limits  of  the 
world,  and  the  future  of  all  humanity  appeals 
to  the  loftiest  souls  as  demanding  their  strenuous 
labours. 

The  best-directed  efforts  of  humanitarians  to-day 
are  aimed  at  the  cultivation  of  forethought  in  the 
minds  and  habits  of  the  lower,  so  called,  improvident 
classes  ot  society.  Wise  governments  are  engaged 
in  providing  secure  depositories  for  small  savings,  in 
devisinor  methods  of  insurance  ao^ainst  want  in  old 
age  and  poverty,  and  in  urging  upon  all  the  wisdom 
of  guarding  property  against  attacks,  thus  aiding  in 
the  survival  of  the  nations. 

These  are  the  primary  factors  of  progress  in  the 
ethnic  mind.  Everywhere  and  at  all  times  their 
assiduous  cultivation  makes  for  national  strenofth  and 
life.  Where  they  are  all  active,  success  is  assured. 
Where  even  one  is  neglected  danger  is  incurred. 

But,  it  will  be  objected,  are  there  not  other  mental 
traits  just  as  necessary, — for  instance,  courage,  en- 
thusiasm, loyalty,  patriotism  ?  Yes,  they  are  some- 
times advantageous,  sometimes  necessary  ;  but  these 
and  similar  emotions  are  secondary  ;  in  themselves, 
they  do  not  insure  progress  ;  in  frequent  instances, 
they  oppose  it,   and    lead    their    possessors    to  ruin. 


64  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

Blind  courage,  for  example,  like  misdirected  energy, 
is  mischievous  and  destructive. 

Emotions  and  sentiments  are  necessary  stimulants 
to  action.  They  are  indefinitely  valuable  in  national 
character,  but  only  to  the  extent  that  they  are 
governed  and  directed  by  intelligence.  In  them- 
selves they  are  blind  and  unreasoning  impulses,  and 
dangerous  guides.  In  culture  history,  they  belong 
to  primitive  or  half-civilised  people,  incapable  of 
holding  rational  conduct.  By  means  of  them,  astute 
and  unscrupulous  rulers  sway  the  masses,  exciting 
them  to  actions  detrimental  to  themselves. 

The  real  factors  in  ethnic  evolution  must  ever  be 
those  which  are  rational,  conscious,  voluntary.  As 
voluntary,  they  require  freedom,  liberty  of  choice 
and  of  action.  Freedom  is  an  external  condition,  and 
unless  it  is  enjoyed  without  other  restraint  than  the 
limitation  of  the  same  privilege  in  others,  the  group 
can  never  reach  its  complete  development.  In  the 
theory  of  progress,  therefore,  it  should  be  always 
given  as  the  primary  condition  of  growth. 

The  physiological  processes  by  which  regressive 
variation  affects  the  ethnic  mind  are  chiefly  three  : 

1.  Absorption  through  concentration  elsewhere. 

2.  Disuse  or  nesflect  of  faculties. 

I 

1     3.   Reaction  from  natural  limitations. 

Such  chano^es  as  these  are  not  merely  consistent 


PHYSIOLOGICAL   VARIATION  65 

with  ethnic  advancement  but  essential  to  it.  They 
indicate  simply  a  re-distribution  of  the  vital  force?^  in 
accordance  with  the  demands  of  new  conditions. 
1  his  IS  a  phenomenon  constantly  seen  in  the  individ- 
ual life  of  organic  beings  of  every  grade,  and  that  it 
extends  to  the  species  and  to  the  mental  powers 
proves  that  it  is  an  universal  law. 

Many'have   maintained    that    regressive    variation 


^      II  — 

proceeds  in  an  inverse  directionfrom  progressive  evo- 
lution, eliminating  the  most  recently  acquired  charac- 
teristics  first.  Not  a  few  have  sought  to  apply  this 
supposed  law  to  ethnic  conditions  and  sociological 
factors.  But  recent  authorities  of  weight,  who  have 
examined  this  question  with  care,  regard  the  instances 
supposed  to  confirm  such  a  theory  as  coincidences 
only,  or  explicable  on  other  grounds. 
-  The  term  "regressive,"  therefore,  is  to  be  un- 
derstood as  applying  to  a  physiological  and  healthy 
process,  by  which  the  sum  of  nutrition  in  an  organism 
is  expended  more  upon  one  or  several  elements  of 
that  organism  at  the  expense  of  other  elements.  The 
latter,  therefore,  reduced  in  sustenance,  undergo 
"  reg^ressive  "  changes,  atrophy,  or  diminish. 

In  mental  life  this  is  paralleled  by  the  cultivation  of 
some  faculties  to  the  neglect  of  others.  Those  to 
which  we  "  pay  attention,"  as  the  phrase  is,  improve, 
while  those  which  we  neMect  are  weakened. 


66  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

What  is  here  noted  of  the  individual  is  true  of  the 
group.  Indeed,  it  is  a  leading  fact  in  the  psychical 
history  of  the  species.  Man  has  paid  heavily  for  all 
his  winnings  in  the  intellectual  field  by  losses  of  many 
a  power  which  would  serve  him  well  had  he  retained 
it.  He  has  forfeited  the  instincts  which  once  were 
his  guides,  the  acuteness  of  his  senses  has  gone,  the 
happy  carelessness  of  his  youth  has  deserted  him. 
We  may  all  join  in  the  lament  of  Mrs.  Browning  : 

"  I  have  lost,  ah,  many  a  pleasure, 
Many  a  hope  and  many  a  power." 

In  applying  these  general  facts  to  the  variations  of 
the  ethnic  mind,  the  principal  distinction  to  observe 
is  between  relative  regressive  and  actual  regressive 
changes. 

The  former  are  not  only  consistent  with  general 
progress,  but  in  some  sense  a  condition  of  it.  In  fol- 
lowing the  steep  ascent  of  advancement,  we  must  cast 
aside  some  of  our  baggage.  We  must  husband  our 
resources  and  spend  them  where  the  return  will  be 
most  bountiful.  Where  we  strike  the  balance  of  our 
mental  losses  and  gains  and  find  it  in  favour  of  general 
improvement,  we  may  rest  content. 

/.  Absorption  through  Concentration  Elsewhere. 
— The  concentration  of  the  ethnic  mind  on  the  cult- 
ivation of  one  group-trait  infallibly  leads  to  a  diminu- 


PHYSIOLOGICAL   VARIATION  67 

tion  of  other  faculties.  The  group  has  a  fixed 
amount  of  time,  activity,  and  mental  force,  and  if  this 
is  concentrated  chiefly  on  one  purpose,  others  must 
suffer. 

History  offers  numberless  examples  of  this.  A  few 
will  suffice.  The  Vikings  of  Norseland  had  but  one 
vocation — war  ;  and  though  they  repeatedly  founded 
kingdoms  in  the  south,  not  one  survived.  The  capa- 
cities for  peaceful  life  were  lost  in  them,  but  for  gen- 
erations they  were  the  terror  of  the  more  numerous 
and  highly  cultured  nations  of  the  south. 

Exclusive  devotion  to  the  relio^ious  sentiment  has 
reduced  many  peoples  to  practical  imbecility,  espe- 
cially where  the  State  has  used  its  powers  to  force 
a  particular  church  upon  the  community.  Nothing, 
indeed,  has  brought  about  more  complete  intellectual 
atrophy. 

These  are  examples  where  the  process  under  con- 
sideration has  been  misdirected  or  carried  too  far. 
When  it  is  properly  guided,  the  compensation  for  the 
loss  or  diminution  of  one  faculty  is  vasily  greater 
than  the  value  of  that  faculty.  Thus,  it  was  through 
the  cultivation  of  his  intelligence  that  early  man  lost 
his  instincts.  Through  an  earnest  desire  for  peace 
which  sprang  up  in  the  cities  of  the  Middle  Ages,  the 
constant  strife  between  the  feudal  nobles  was  meas- 
urably checked,  to  the  signal  advantage  of  the  nation. 


68  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

Where  the  stress  of  mental  attention  Is  directed 
to  the  cultivation  of  secondary  traits  or  of  those 
which  make  against  the  general  welfare,  the  process 
is  still  physiological  ;  it  may,  indeed,  for  the  time 
be  advantageous,  concentrating  the  group-feeling 
and  fitting  the  nation  for  its  immediate  conditions. 
Thus,  in  the  present  age,  industrialism  attracts  to  Its 
sphere  most  of  the  ability  of  several  leading  nations. 
It  offers  not  In  Itself  a  high  Ideal  of  life,  but  appears 
to  be  one  peculiarly  suited  to  the  prevailing  con- 
ditions of  humanity.  It  stores  reserve  national  force 
which  will,  doubtless,  in  time  be  expended  on  nobler 
aims. 

2.  Disuse  or  Neglect  of  FacMlties. — The  impair- 
ment of  mental  powers  through  disuse  Is  one  of  the 
most  common  phenomena  of  psychology.  Men  are 
much  more  colour-blind  than  women,  because  they 
exert  less  the  faculty  of  distinguishing  hues.  Per- 
sons who  do  not  practise  memorising  soon  lose  the 
power. 

fin  the  history  of  nations  this  has  been  most  con- 
spicuous in  the  neglect  of  the  military  spirit ;  Car- 
thage  yielded  to  Rome,  and  Rome  to  the  barbarian, 
chiefly  because  a  distaste  for  personal  exposure  in 
combat  led  each  nation  In  time  to  depend  on  merce- 
narles  for  defence.  For  centuries  In  China  the  voc- 
ation of  the  soldier  has  been  looked  upon  as  Inferior 


PHYSIOLOGICAL   VARIATION  69 

to  that  of  the  scholar  or  the  statesman  ;  and,  however 
just  this  might  be  in  the  abstract,  it  so  weakened  the 
national  integrity  that  the  vast  Sinitic  empire  is  now 
totterinor  to  ruin. 

o 

Disuse  may  arise  from  two  conditions  :  the  one, 
from  neglect  and  overattention  to  other  faculties  ; 
the  other,  from  absence  of  opportunity. 

Both  are  abundantly  represented  in  ethnic  psycho- 
logy. Of  the  former,  I  have  just  given  instances ; 
while  of  the  latter  the  deliberate  avoidance  by  large 
groups  of  certain  areas  of  mental  life  are  examples 
in  point.  Thus,  the  Society  of  Friends  (Quakers) 
have  for  two  hundred  and  fifty  years  expelled  the 
cultivation  of  the  fine  arts  from  their  education. 
The  result  is  a  loss  of  the  aesthetic  faculties,  but  a 
remarkable  gain  in  other  directions — such  as  sobri- 
ety, longevity,  business  success.  Whether  the  com- 
pensation is  sufficient  seems,  however,  to  be  decided 
in  the  negative  by  the  Friends  themselves. 

Other  examples  present  themselves.  The  aris- 
tocracy of  Siam  regard  all  forms  of  work  as  so 
degrading  that  they  allow  their  finger-nails  to  grow 
^v^  or  six  inches  in  length  to  prove  that  their  hands 
have  never  been  soiled  with  labour.  Needless  to 
say  that  this  disuse  of  their  muscles  is  followed  by 
atrophy  of  their  brain-cells,  so  that  they  are  an 
emasculate    and    enfeebled    group.     The    theory   of 


70  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

concentration  and  disuse  of  faculties  In  the  group  led 
to  the  system  of  castes,  the  most  striking  example  of 
which  is  in  India,  where  they  are  divided  upon  race 
lines.  The  white  Brahmans  are  the  priests,  legis- 
lators, scholars,  and  diplomats  ;  the  red  Rajpoots  are 
the  warriors  and  chieftains  ;  the  yellow  Mongols  are 
the  commercial  and  agricultural  class ;  while  the 
black  Dravidians  are  the  mechanics  and  herdsmen. 
Each  caste  adopts  its  special  branch  of  activity  and 
avoids  that  traditionally  belonging  to  another  caste. 

Although  a  similar  theory  has  been  widely  popular 
in  many  states,  such  a  division  of  labour  and  respons- 
ibility has  in  it  elements  of  debility  which  in  the  long 
run  must  bring  about  social  disintegration.  It  con- 
flicts with  the  unity  of  the  ethnic  mind. 

3.  Reaction  from  Natu^^al  Limitations. — As  there 
is  a  difference  in  the  mental  aptitudes  of  individuals 
which  no  training  can  equalise,  so  there  is  in  those 
of  human  groups.  Its  causes  do  not  concern  us 
here.     The  fact  remains  and  must  be  faced. 

There  are  natural  limitations  to  each  mind  and 
to  each  group  of  minds.  Compared  with  the  most 
highly  gifted,  the  less  so  stand  in  the  physiological 
relation  of  "  rudimentary  organs."  When  brought 
into  contact,  the  latter  will  either  succumb  or  accept 
a  subordinate  position. 

The  American   Indians,   as  a  race,   were  compar- 


PHYSIOLOGICAL  ■  VARIA  TION  71 

atively  highly  gifted.  They  created  an  order  of  archi- 
tecture and  even  devised  a  system  of  phonetic  writing ; 
but  none  of  their  states  was  of  long  duration,  and  none 
of  their  so-called  *'  empires  "  rose  above  the  level  of  a 
temporary  confederacy. 

The  limitations  of  the  racial  mind  were  such  that  a 
complex  social  organisation  was  impossible  for  them. 
Ln  the  forms  of  their  highest  governments,  those  of 
the  Aztecs,  Mayas,  and  Peruvians,  we  see  repeated  on 
a  large  scale  the  simple  and  insufficient  models  of  the 
rude  hunting  tribes  of  the  plains. 

This  is  also  true  of  the  black  race  of  Africa.  The 
powerful  monarchies  which  at  times  have  been  erected 
in  that  continent  over  the  dead  bodies  of  myriads  of 
victims  have  lasted  but  a  generation  or  two.  The 
natural  limitations  of  the  racial  mind  prevented  it. 

Many  other  examples  could  be  cited.  Indeed,  the 
law  of  "thus  far  shalt  thou  otq  and  no  farther"  tells 

o 

the  story  of  most  of  the  failures  of  races  and  peoples. 
They  fell  through  mental  inability  to  succeed.  They 
had  reached  the  natural  limit  of  their  activities. 

But  there  is  in  this  no  occasion  to  deduce  a  con- 
clusion of  fatalism.  These  limitations  have  been 
operative  in  great  measure  because  they  have  been 
unrecognised,  and  no  effort  has  been  made  to  escape 
them.  Though  they  may  not  be  remedied,  their  evil 
effects  may  be  avoided  by  enlightened  prevision.    They 


72  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

act  like  other  natural  laws,  and  all  such  laws  can  be 

turned  to  man's  advantage,  If  he  sets  about  it  wisely. 

Modes  and  Rates  of  Ethnic  Variation. — Both 

prooressive    and    regressive    mental    variations    are 


formed  of  constructive,  synthetic  evolution  ;  both  are 
necessary  to  general  advancement ;  both  have  their 
place  in  the  scheme  of  national  health  and  growth. 
They  belong  among  what  the  physiologist  calls 
"  anabolic  "  processes — those  whose  tendency  is  to  pre- 
serve and  develop  the  species. 

There  has,  however,  been  frequent  misunderstand- 
ing of  the  modes  of  action  of  these  processes  and  the 
rate  or~their  movement.  This  misconception  exists 
widely  to-day.  Many  writers  have  mistaken  actual 
advance  for  degeneration,  or  claimed  that  some  nation 
or  stage  of  culture  was  superior  to  another  from  some 
sinorle  real  or  imas^ined  feature.  Thus  Rousseau  and 
his  school,  enamoured  of  the  supposed  personal  free- 
dom of  the  savage,  lauded  the  existence  of  man  *'  in  a 
state  of  nature  "  ;  and  their  followers  still  assail  modern 
civilisation  as  a  failure.  V^ 

It  becomes  important,  therefore,  to  examine  the 
modes  of  healthy  progress  so  that  we  may  understand 
its  sometimes  strange  aspects. 

These  modes  are  three  in  number : 

I.  In  lines,  either  parallel  (homoplastic)  or  diver- 
gent (heteroplastic). 


PHYSIOLOGICAL   VARIATION  73 

2.  In  circles,  or  curved  forms  (spirals). 

3.  In  waves,  rhythmic  undulatory  forms. 

I.  Parallel  and  Divergent  Variatioiu — Evolutionists 
are  familiar  with  these  two  forms  of  progressive  varia- 
tion in  the  organic  world.  They  are  equally  evident 
in  human  progress. 

No  fact  in  ethnology  is  more  striking  than  the 
parallelisms  of  primitive  culture.  Go  where  we  will 
among  the  savage  tribes  of  the  globe,  we  find  them 
developing  the  same  arts  along  the  same  lines,  fram- 
ing their  tribal  organisations  on  the  same  models, 
calling  in  similar  words  on  the  same  gods.  Not  only 
in  this  but  in  what  seem  matters  of  caprice,  fancy,  and 
local  colour,  the  same  similarity,  almost  identity,  pre- 
vails. They  tell  stories  of  like  plots,  decorate  their 
weapons  in  like  patterns,  dance  and  sing  in  like  forms. 

Yet,  though  so  much  alike,  so  "  tarred  with  the 
same  stick,"  each  tribe  and  group  is  different.  Each 
has  its  own  imprint  and  character.  Each  has  its 
points  of  individuality. 

This  is  **  divergent  "  variation,  just  as  universal, 
just  as  inevitable  as  the  parallelism  we  have  been 
considerinof.  This  extends  into  minute  and  seem- 
ingly  unimportant  details.  We  may,  for  example, 
compare  the  stone  axes  of  neighbouring  American 
tribes.      In  a  casual  survey,  they  look  alike  ;  a  close 


74  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

inspection  reveals  slight  but  constant  differences. 
The  trained  eye  can  distinguish  their  place  of  origin 
without  difficulty. 

This  inherent  divergence  is  so  profound  that  two 
well-marked  groups  become  incapable  of  mental 
unity.  They  may  be  separated  by  an  imaginary 
line,  and  have  been  for  generations  under  like  clim- 
atic and  cultural  conditions,  but  the  imprint  of  the 
divergence  is  ineradicable.  If  they  have  the  same 
religion,  they  will  understand  it  differently  ;  the 
same  events  will  impress  them  differently  ;  their 
feeling  and  their  hopes  will  be  asunder. 

While  this  is  true,  it  is  also  true  that  a  new 
stimulus  to  progress  is  created  by  the  union  of  di- 
vero^ent  lines  of  thouofht.  The  resultant  is  a  fresh 
element  in  mental  life,  a  new  birth  independent  of 
either  parent. 

Such  unions  are  brought  about  either  by  similarity 
or  contrast.  There  is  a  species  of  elective  affinity 
between  certain  lines  of  psychical  development  which 
at  once  unites  them  as  they  approach  each  other. 

There  is  also  a  similar  union  induced  by  con- 
trasted psychical  states.  We  say  familiarly  that 
"  opposites  attract  each  other,"  and  it  is  a  maxim  drawn 
from  frequent  experience.  The  rapid  changes  from 
social  freedom  to  military  tyranny  in  the  mercurial 
population    of    some    states    seem    more    gratifying 


PHYSIOLOGICAL   VARIATION  75 

to  the  ethnic  spirit  than  a  continued  stable  gov- 
ernment. 

Parallel  variations  lead  to  similarity  in  products. 
They  are  '*  homoplastic,"  to  use  the  term  of  the 
evolutionist.  Primitive  tribes,  developing  under  the 
same  general  conditions  of  environment,  are  strik- 
ingly alike  in  culture. 

Divergent  variations  are  ''  heteroplastic,"  that  is, 
they  lead  to  new  products,  and  hence  are  the  higher 
activities  in  all  that  makes  for  advancement.  What- 
ever multiplies  them  stimulates  the  growth  of 
culture. 

2.  Variation  in  Circles  or  CiirTJes. (—Both  parallel 
and  divergent  evolution  are  expressions  of  continuity 
of  progress  in  lines,  extending  from  point  to  point, 
intersectmg  to  produce  other  lines  of  new  directions. 

Such  a  rectilinear  scheme  is  the  simplest  that  we 
can  sketch  of  human  advancement  ;  and  for  many 
purposes  it  is  sufficiently  correct.  It  does  not,  how- 
ever, fully  express  the  geometrical  representation  of 
such  acrencies  as  we  are  considering.  ( Professor 
Baldwin  has  justly  remarked  that  there  is  a  "  circular 
activitv  "  in  all  prop-ress.  Its  influence  is  not  aimed 
solely  at  a  point  ahead,  but  extends  itself  in  all 
directions.  The  reception  of  a  new  and  true  idea 
in  the  human  mind  may  be  likened  to  the  introduc- 
tion of  a  ray  of  sunlight  into  a  darkened  room.      Its 


76  E  THNIC  PS  VCHOLOG  V 

chief   force   Is   seen   in  the  Hnear  shaft  of  light,  but 

^ 

the  illumination  extends  in  some  degree  to  the  whole 

space^ 

Johannes  Schmidt  has  shown  that  the  distribution 
of  the  early  Aryan  dialects  and  religions  was  not 
from  the  point  of  common  origin  by  right  lines  of 
migration  in  different  directions,  but  should  be 
represented  diagrammatically  by  a  series  of  irregular 
circles  and  ellipses,  overlapping  each  other.  The 
tendency  to  variation  arises  in  some  centre  and 
spreads  from  It  In  a  series  of  curves.  These  meeting 
others  lead  to  an  "  Interlinking  "  of  cultural  areas. 

This  Is  true  of  the  other  elements  of  ethnic  culture. 
The  localities  where  many  such  overlappings  occurred 
became  secondary  centres  from  which  In  turn  the 
circular  activity  of  culture  was  propagated. 

A  mart  where  many  visitors  from  different  nations 
congregated  would  receive  some  new  learning  from 
all  and  through  Its  concentration  would  Impart  this 
higher  potency  In  some  measure  to  all.  For  ex- 
ample, the  city  of  Nippur,  on  the  Babylonian  plain, 
attracted  twenty-five  hundred  years  ago  to  its  markets 
not  only  Assyrians  and  Edomltes,  but  Medes  and 
Persians  from  the  East,  Syrians  and  HIttites  from 
the  West,  and  probably  Greeks  and  Egyptians  and 
Arabians  from  remoter  lands. 
/'    Human    progress    has   been  likened  by    some    to 


PHYSIOLOGICAL   VARIATION  11 

a  spiral^^ure  where  each  advance  is  a  repetition  of  a 
former  stage  but  with  improvements  to  it.  This  is 
a  combination  of  the  right  Hne  and  the  curve  ;  but 
the  notion  that  repetition  or  recapitulatjnn  pxi^t^  in 
evokition  in  any  other  form  than  that  of  renewed 
effort  finds  Httle  support  in  natural  science. 

3.  Variatio7i  171  Waves,  or  Rhythmic  U7idtclatio7is. 
—  Some  of  the  most  recent  speculations  on  the  ult- 
imate forces  of  the  universe  lead  to  the  belief  that 
they  are  maintained  in  activity  by  an  eternal  rhythmic 
pulsation  or  undulation,  generating  its  energy  from  its 
periods  of  repose. 

This  doctrine  has  been  applied  by  Professor  Ger- 
land  to  the  progress  of  the  human  race.  His  teach- 
ing is  that  after  a  period  of  rapid  advance  there 
follows  one  of  depression,  which  in  turn  is  succeeded 
by  another  of  advance,  reaching  a  hiojifr  development 
than  any  which  preceded  it. 

Other  writers  have  expressed  this  notion  in  the 
form  that  after  a  period  of  activity  and  invention  fol- 
lows one  of  repose  and  reflection,  giving  way  in  turn 
to  another  of  activity. 

The  Rate  of  Progress. — Professor  de  Mortillet 
calculates  from  a  wide  range  of  data,  geologic  and 
archaeologic,  that  man  has  lived  on  the  earth  about 
240,000  years.  The  most  conservative  student  of 
prehistoric  records  would  not  estimate  the  life  of  our 


78  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

species  at  less  than  fifty  thousand  years,  and  it  is 
much  more  Hkely  to  be  double  that  duration. 

The  date  of  anything  like  civilisation  is  much  more 
recent.  Even  in  its  oldest  centres,  as  Egypt  or 
Babylonia,  to  place  its  beginning  ten  thousand  years 
ago  is  to  exceed  the  demands  of  the  boldest  anti- 
quary ;  while  over  most  of  the  now  civilised  areas  of 
the  globe  a  condition  of  barbarism  prevailed  until  less 
than  two  thousand  years  ago. 

These  facts  prove  wide  variations  in  the  rate  of 
progress,  very  slow  movements  in  earlier  times  and 
lower  conditions,  singularly  rapid  advances  in  later 
hiofh  conditions. 

We  are  led  to  the  conclusion,  therefore,  that  the 
rate  is  not  by  one  mode  of  progression  but  by  sev- 
eral. 

1.  By  arithmetical  progession  (addition). 

2.  By  geometrical  progression  (multiplication). 

3.  By  saltatory  progression  (permutation). 
These  are  not  to   be   applied   too   strictly,   but  it 

is  safe  to  make  the  general  statement  about  them 
that  they  correspond  to  the  three  stages  of  culture, 
— savagery,  half-culture,  and  full-culture. 

The  simplest  rate  is  by  adding  one  invention  or  art 
tjQLBXUQther,  as  does  the  savage  in  his  lowest  stage  to- 
day  and  as  did  primitive  man  for  myriads  of  years. 
Each  such  addition  is  so  much  gained,  but  reflects  lit- 


PHYSIOLOGICAL   VARIATION  79 

tie  improvement  on  the  general  life.  Thus  the  Aus- 
tralian began  with  a  stone  fastened  to  a  wooden 
handle,  and  with  which  he  could  strike  a  blow,  scratch 
the  earth,  or  tear  flesh.  To  this  he  added  in  time  a 
spear  or  javelin,  a  club,  and  finally  that  curious  weapon, 
the  boomerang.  Each  of  these  inventions  helped  him 
just  to  the  extent  he  used  it  and  not  more.  His  gen- 
eral condition  was  not  bettered  beyond  that  amount. 
It  was  as  if  he  had  added  a  hundred  dollars  to  his 
capital  and  enjoyed  the  interest  of  the  investment. 
His  was  arithmetical  progression. 

This  merely  arithmetical  progression  by  simple  ad- 
dition, 2  +  2  +  2  +  2  =  8,  explains  why  the  intro- 
duction or  invention  of  very  important  technical 
procedures  have  frequently  been  of  no  influence  on 
the  general  culture  of  a  people.  Thus,  the  smelting 
and  forofinof  of  iron  has  been  known  from  time  imme- 
morial  among  the  African  blacks,  and  many  of  them 
are  skilful  blacksmiths ;  but  beyond  its  immediate 
convenience  for  weapons,  the  art  did  them  no  benefit. 
The  Chinese  knew  the  compass  and  gunpowder  many 
centuries  before  the  Europeans,  but  their  methods  of 
war  and  navigation  received  no  impulse  from  these 
potent  allies. 

French  physiologists  have  defined  the  human  brain 
as  "  an  organ  of  repetition  and  multiplication."  So 
long  as  its  activities  are  confined  to  mere  imitation, 


8o  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

following  a  set  example,  it  employs  the  former  func- 
tion only,  and  the  progress  of  the  group  must  be  very 
slow. 

This  was  not  Mr.  Lewis  H.  Morgan's  opinion. 
That  thouohtful  ethnoloo^ist  maintained  that  ''  from 
first  to  last  human  progress  has  been  in  a  ratio  not 
rigorously  but  essentially  geometrical."  But  the 
arguments  on  which  he  chiefly  based  this  maxim,  so 
far  as  it  applies  to  primitive  conditions  were  the 
development  of  articulate  speech  and  the  social, 
"  gentile  "  organisation  ;  and  neither  of  these  resulted 
from  a  conscious  effort  of  mind. 

/  Prog^ress  does  proceed  in  a  geometrical  ratio — that 
is,  by  multiplication,  when  an  invention  reacts  on  the 
sum  of  the  ethnic  possessions  to  increase  their  gen- 
eral value — when,  as  we  say,  it  has  an  indefinite 
number  of  "  applications."  This  is  seei>  in  the  recog- 
nition of  the  mechanical  powers,  —  the  lever,  the 
pulley,  the  screw,  the  weighing-beam,  and  so  on.  In 
ship-building,  the  oar,  the  rudder,  and  the  sail  im- 
proved the  whole  system  of  water  transportation. 

Geometrical  ratio  increases  rapidly.  It  is  repre- 
sented by  a  series  2X2X2X2=16.  but  the  aug- 
ment by  permutation  is  still  greater.  /Thjs  is  shown 
in  the  series  2X3X4X5  =  120.  Mr.  George  lies 
claims  that  this  is  the  true  rate  of  modern  progress 
as  represented  by  the  effect  on  the  world  of  printing. 


PHYSIOLOGICAL   VARIATION  Si 

Steam,  electricity,  and  photography.  ^  This  is  progress 
**  saltatory,"  or  by  leaps.  It  explains,  he  believes,  the 
sudden  and  rapid  advance  of  some  periods,  and  also 
the  losses  of  continuity  sometimes  observed.  His 
maxim  is :  '*  The  newest  of  the  factors  of  culture 
multiplies  all  the  factors  which  went  before  it." 

6 


CHAPTER  IV 

PATHOLOGICAL   VARIATION  IN  THE  ETHNIC 

MIND 

A  AyTE  have  seen  In  the  preceding  chapter  that 
^  '  atrophy  and  regression  are  an  essential  pro- 
cess of  progressive  evolution,  necessary  in  order  that 
the  preponderance  of  nutrition  may  be  cast  in  favour 
of  the  most  useful  organs  and  structures. 

This  is  ''physiological"  degeneration,  "degenera- 
tion  with  compensation,"  the  result  of  which  is  finally 
favourable  to  the  general  economy. 

But  there  is  another  form  of  degeneration,  the 
tendency  of  which  is  distinctly  injurious  to  the 
organism  as  a  whole,  and  which,  if  unchecked,  would 
compass  its  destruction.  This  is  "pathological  de- 
generation," "  degeneration  without  compensation." 

Although  such  processes  are  also  biologic, —  that 
is,  carried  on  by  life  products  (cellular  neoplasms), — 
they  are  incapable  of  independent  existence  and  are 

always  warring  against  that  of  the  organism  in  which 

82 


PATHOLOGICAL  VARIATION  83 


they  are  engenderecl/__jLJ.s  an  axiom  that  the  laws 
of  progressive  evolution  do  not  apply  to  pathological 
processes  (Virchow). 

In  the  history  of  the  mental  life  of  individuals  and 
nations  we  find  a  striking  parallelism  to  these  physical 
processes,  certain  degenerations  bringing  with  them 
compensations  in  the  growth  of  higher  faculties, 
others  tending  inevitably  to  the  destruction  of  the 
individual  or  the  group.  The  latter  belongs  to  the 
domain  of  "ethnic  psycho-pathology." 

Psychologists  have  shunned  this  field.  "  Psycho- 
logy," says  a  recent  American  writer,  "  must  concern 
itself  with  the  7iorvtal  mind  "  ;  and  a  German  author 
of  merit  has  insisted  that  mental  pathology  has  no 
place  in  ethnology,  because  this  science  occupies 
itself  only  with  the  progress  of  mankind. 

Much  more  correct  is  the  opinion  of  Dr.  Ireland 
that  "  it  is  quite  erroneous  to  treat  the  history  of 
the  human  race  as  that  of  the  sane  alone  "  ;  and,  in- 
deed, we  may  almost  go  so  far  as  Professor  Capitan, 
of  the  School  of  Anthropology  of  Paris,  and  say : 
"  Everybody  is  diseased.  Nobody  is  healthy.  We 
are  obliged  to  study  mankind  in  a  constantly  morbid 
condition  of  body  and  mind."  Or  we  may  go  as  far 
as  Pascal,  when  he  says,  '*  Men  are  naturally  so  in- 
sane that  he  is  deemed  insane  who  is  not  insane  with 
the  rest." 


84  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

Ethnic  psychology  is  obHged  to  take  into  account 
the  constant  presence  and  powerful  action  of  patho- 
logical mental  elements.  Tribes  and  nations  have 
been  destroyed  by  war  or  by  catastrophes  ;  but  much 
more  frequently  some  disease  of  the  ethnic  mind 
itself  has  prepared  its  own  extinction. 

Here  an  important  distinction  is  necessary.  Ethnic 
mental  disease  has  no  relation  to  the  frequency  of  in- 
dividual cases  of  insanity.  These  do  not  affect  the 
ethnic  mind  because  that  is  the  outcome  of  the  in- 
telligence of  the  community,  not  of  its  irresponsible 
members. 

For  this  reason  ethnic  psycho-pathology  cannot  be 
discussed  wholly  from  the  standpoint  of  insanity, 
although  the  analogies  are  such  that  we  can  profit- 
ably compare  them  in  outline,  and  this  I  shall  attempt. 

A  definition  is  sometimes  useful,  so  I  present  the 
followinof  : 
/  A  pathological  condition  of  the  ethnic  mind  is 
present  when  it  is  chronically  incapable  of  directing 
the  activities  of  the  group  correctly  toward  self- 
preservation  and  development. 

Like  all  definitions  in  natural  science,  this  one  Is 
not  to  be  applied  literally  In  all  cases.  The  incap- 
acity may  be  present  and  yet  not  to  such  a  degree 
as  to  be  positively  destructive.  All  nations  have  some 
insane  tendencies,  as  have   all  Individuals ;  and  It  is 


PATHOLOGICAL   VARIATION  85 

true,  as  a  specialist  has  said  :  "  The  more  one  knows 
of  insanity,  the  less  does  it  seem  to  differ  from  the 
normal  condition." 

These  pathological  traits  of  the  ethnic  mind  can  be 
analysed  and  classified.       They  will  be  found  to  arise 

1.  From  some  intellectual  deficiency  or  perver- 
sion ;  or 

2.  From  some  persistent  disturbance  of  the  emo- 
tional life. 

No  one  will  demand  that  every  member  of  a  group 
should  suffer  from  such  conditions  in  order  that  its 
collective  mind  should  betray  morbid  consequences. 
It  is  enough  if  a  majority,  or  even  a  decided  min- 
ority, providing  it  exerts  the  requisite  influence  on 
the  mass,  is  in  such  a  pathological  state.  A  degen- 
erate nobility  or  a  dissolute  priesthood  has  often 
worked  the  ruin  of  a  state  through  the  contagion  of 
example  and  its  control  of  lower  classes. 

Before  considering  in  detail  the  varied  forms  under 
which  these  diseased  mental  traits  present  them- 
selves, it  will  be  well  to  examine  the  general  causes 
to  which  they  are  due. 

Etiology. — ^EacJi  of  such  pathological  conditions 
of  the  ethnic  mind  has  a  basis  in  some  prevailing 
physical  neurosis,  the  origin  of  which  can  he  traced  in 
the  ethnic  history,  and  which  becomes  hereditary  in 
the  stock.      For  of  these  two  principles   no  student 


86  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

of  the  subject  can  doubt,  (i)  that  every  patho- 
hogicarmental  manifestation  corresponds  to  a  neuro- 
pathic change,  and  (2)  that  whatever  may  be  said 
about  the  transmission  of  acquired  characters  in 
physiology,  no  physician  can  for  a  moment  doubt 
that  morbid,  infection  maybej)assed  down  from 
generation  to  generation. 


or  these  reasons  the  study  of  causes  in  ethnic 
pathology  becomes  of  enormous  practical  moment. 
Only  by  an  acquaintance  with  them  can  preventive 
and  curative  remedies  be  applied. 

These  causes  are,  at  first,  always  external  and 
individuaL  They  proceed  from  some  form  of  '*  en- 
vironment," mental  or  physical.  But  the  morbid  im- 
pression, once  fully  received,  is  often  indelible, 
becomes  fixed  in  the  type,  and  is  but  little  influenced 
by  external  agencies. 

These  primary  causes  of  true  .gthnjc  deg'eneration 
I  shall  consider  under  four  headings. 

1.  Imperfect  Nutrition. 

2.  Sexual  Subversions. 

3.  Toxic  Agents. 

4.  Mental  Shocks. 

No  one  of  these  can  act  in  the  long  run  in  other 
than  a  deleterious  manner  on  the  ethnic  mind.  There 
is  nothing  "  compensatory "  In  any  one  of  them  or 
so  little  that  it  need  not  be  reckoned. 


PATHOLOGICAL   VARIATION  87 

I.  I7)ipcrfcct  Nutrition. — It  has  been  said  broadly 
that  all  psycho-pathic  and  regressive  conditions  arise 
from  malnutrition  (Fere).  This  is  true,  in  a  sense, 
but  does  not  carry  us  far  in  the  direction  of  treat- 
ment.    We  ask  a  closer  definition  of  origins. 

There  is  no  doubt  of  the  intimate  relationship  of 
ample  nutrition  and  intellectual  progress ;  but  while 
it  is  well  to  avoid  the  ancient  notion  of  the  inde- 
pendence of  soul  and  body  and  that  the  former  is 
superior  to  the  latter,  we  must  guard  against  the 
modern  extreme  of  Buckle  and  his  followers,  that  the 
history  of  nations  can  be  traced  to  the  food  they  eat. 
Man  is  omnivorous,  and  his  well-being  is  nourished 
by  food  of  any  kind,  providing  it  is  nutritious  and 
easily  assimilable.  The  effort  which  has  often  been 
made  to  trace  the  character  of  tribes  and  nations  to 
some  prevalent  diet — be  it  of  fish  or  fiesh,  or  veget- 
able products — is  fanciful,  and  yields  no  positive 
facts.  What  does  harm  is  not  some  particular  kind 
but  a  general  insufficiency  of  aliment. 

Imperfect  nutrition  may  be  traced  to  three  principal 
sources,  i.  Insufficient  or  unsuitable  food.  2.  Lack 
of  variety.      3.    Improper  preparation  of  food. 

The  careful  researches  of  Collignon,  Ranke,  Am- 
nion, and  others  have  traced  the  stunted  forms, 
defective  bodies,  and  low  intellectual  development 
of  the  Lapps,  the    mountaineers  of   central   Europe 


88  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

and  the  Bushmen  of  the  Kahhari  desert  to  one  cause, 
la  mi'sdre,  lack  of  sufficient  and  appropriate  food. 
Thi9  js  rertain  to  bring  about  degeneration  of  organs, 
incomplete  development,  and  loss  of  brain  power. 
Contiriued_,th rough  generations,  a  hereditary  taint 
is  engendered  which  saps  the  vigour  of  the  stock, 
and  cannot  1be  eradicated  by  improved  conditions. 

Unsuitable  food  is  usually  consumed  on  account 
of  the  scarcity  of  better  material,  but  at  times 
from  a  morbid  craving.  Examples  are  the  unctuous 
clay  which  was  swallowed  by  various  tribes  in  America 
and  Australia,  and  also  by  some  of  the  ''poor  white 
trash  "  of  Georgia.  The  ergoted  rye  and  maize  to 
which  some  of  the  peasantry  of  France  and  Italy  are 
forced  to  have  recourse  exerts  a  disastrous  influence 
on  both  body  and  mind. 

But  food  may  be  ever  so  excellent  in  itself,  yet 
unsuitable  to  the  geographic  and  other  conditions. 
The  Eskimo  thrives  on  blubber  and  raw  fish  ;  but 
such  a  diet  in  Ceylon  would  be  as  inappropriate 
as  the  Hindoo's  boiled  rice  for  an  exclusive  diet  in 
Greenland. 

Lack  of  variety  interferes  with  nutrition  even  when 
the  food  material  itself  is  ample.  By  structure  and 
habit  man  is  omnivorous,  and  suffers  when  confined 
to  a  single  article  of  diet.  The  blood  becomes  de- 
praved and  scorbutic  symptoms  often  appear.      Na- 


PATHOLOGICAL  VARIATION  89 

tlons  who  mainly  live  on  some  one  substance — rice, 
cassava,  potatoes,  etc. — suffer,  lose  their  power  of 
adaptation  to  their  surroundings,  as  was  remarked 
by  Alexander  von  Humboldt,  and  are  more  liable  to 
disease.  Owing-  also  to  the  partial  sustenance  thus 
furnished,  the  brain-cells  are  less  progressive  and 
energetic.  There  are  nearly  a  score  of  chemical 
elements  in  the  body,  all  of  which  must  be  sup- 
plied by  the  aliment  if  maximum  physical  health 
is  to  be  attained  and  the  highest  energy  and  moral 
vigour  are  desired  ;  for,  although  it  is  not  correct  to 
assert,  as  some  have  claimed,  that  the  physical  insures 
psychical  perfection,  it  is  undoubtedly  true  that  the 
mind  is  never  at  its  best  in  a  feeble  and  sickly  body. 
Dr.  Johnson  was  more  than  half  right  when  he 
argued  that  a  sick  man  is  a  scoundrel  ! 

A  volume  migrht  be  wTitten  on  the  influence  of 
the  preparation  of  food  on  national  character.  Cook- 
ery is  one  of  the  fine  arts,  and  its  development  has 
been  parallel  with  general  culture.  No  tribe  takes 
its  food  habitually  raw.  The  Eskimo  will  freeze 
it  first,  the  Tartar  readies  his  steak  by  placing  it 
beneath  his  saddle,  and  the  African  cannibal  will 
soak  his  human  morsel  in  water.  Before  pots  or 
kettles  were  invented,  the  flesh  was  roasted  over  the 
fire  or  in  trenches  covered  with  hot  coals. 

Cookery    renders    food    more     assimilable,     more 


90  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

digestible,  and  thus  allows  the  brain  a  better  chance 
to  do  its  work.  Frying  hardens  and  soddens  food, 
and  the  frying-pan  is,  therefore,  an  enemy  to  civilis- 
ation. Chewing  coarse,  hard,  and  uncooked  food 
develops  the  muscles  of  the  jaws  and  makes  the 
face  "  prognathic,"  an  almost  sure  sign  of  intellectual 
inferiority,  and  directly  connected  with  an  unfavour- 
able shape  of  the  skull.  The  man  who  invented  the 
mill  was  one  of  the  greatest  benefactors  to  his  race. 
Condiments  add  to  the  digestibility  of  food  and  hold 
an  important  place  in  its  preparation.  Salt  and 
pepper  thus  sharpen  the  intellect. 

2^^^^uku£^t^zon  of  Sex-relations. — There  is  nothing 
more  vital  to  the  growth,  even  to  the  very  existence, 
of  a  nation  than  the  sex-relations  which  it  favours  by 
its  laws,  customs,  and  preferences.  Upon  these 
depend  the  processes  of  natural  selection  by  which 
the  number  and  the  power  of  future  generations  are 
decided  through  inflexible  rules.  If  these  relations, 
as  established  by  the  fixed  natural  laws  of  species- 
perpetuation,  are  traversed  by  ignorance  or  wilful 
disobedience,  nothing  can  prevent  the  injury  to 
the  physical  strength  and  mental  ability  of  the 
offspring. 

Such  subversions  of  the  sex-relations  may  be  pre- 
sentedunder  five  headings  : 

{a)  Premature  and  delayed  marriage. 


PATHOLOGICAL  VARIATION  91 

(J))  Abnormal  forms  of  marriage. 

{c)  ABstention    from   marriage  through  various 
causes. 

{ci)   Licentiousness.      Divorce. 

(e)  Dlminutton  of  nataHty.  InfertiHty. 
(a)  Premature  and  Delayed  Marriage. —  Mr. 
Galton,  in  one  of  his  thoughtful  works,  remarks : 
"  An  enormous  effect  upon  the  average  natural 
ability  of  a  race  may  be  produced  by  influences 
which  retard  the  averaofe  aofe  of  marriage  or  hasten 
it."  He  has  illustrated  this  by  abundant  examples 
now  through  his  many  writings  familiar  to  the  pub- 
lic, his  general  thesis  being  that  the  wisest  policy 
for  a  nation  is  to  retard  the  ao^e  of  marriao^e  amonof 
the  weak  and  to  hasten  it  amonof  the  vioforous  classes. 
This  is,  of  course,  to  be  construed  within  physio- 
logical  lines  ;  premature  relations  of  the  sexes,  too 
early  marriages,  are  disastrous  in  every  respect. 
Statistics  of  European  armies  show  that  there  is  a 
lar  higher  mortality  and  much  more  sickness  among 
the  soldiers  who  have  married  young  than  among 
sinorle  men  of  the  same  ag^e.     Certain  Australian  and 

o        „  ■  - 5 

South  American  tribes  force  their  female  children 
of  immature  age  into  marital  relations,  and  to  this 
is  due  the  rapid  decrease  of  their  numbers. 

{b)  Abnor7}ial  Forms  of  Marriage. — Among  early 
Semitic    tribes,    and    to-day   in    parts    of    Tibet    and 


92  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

India,  the  custom  prevails  of  "polyandry,"  in  which 
one  woman  Is  the  wife  of  several  husbands.  This 
sometimes  arose  from  female  infanticide,  sometimes, 
as  In  Tibet,  where  all  the  brothers  of  a  family  have 
one  wife  in  common,  in  order  to  preserve  undivided 
the  family  property.  ^ 

(c)  Abstention  from  Marriage, — Mr.  Galton,  has 
pointed  out  with  great  force  the  injury  worked  by 
sacerdotal  celibacy  in  the  history  of  European  civilis- 
ation. The  commendation  of  the  single  life  in  man 
or  woman  as  "the  better  part"  has  been  by  no 
means  confined  to  certain  sects  of  Christianity. 
Long  before  that  religion  started,  this  sacrifice  was 
enjoined  on  the  priests  of  Cybele,  the  virgins  of 
Vesta,  the  Egyptian  ministrants,  and  many  other 
officials  in  Old  World  rites ;  while  in  the  New 
World  not  only  were  there  houses  of  "nuns"  among 
the  Quechuas  of  Peru  and  the  Mayas  of  Yucatan, 
but  the  priests  in  those  cults  and  even  the  "  medi- 
cine men  "  of  rude  Northern  tribes  were  frequently 
vowed  to  perpetual  and  absolute  chastity. 

In  the  struggle  of  modern  life,  and  also  in  the 
greater  facility  for  the  pursuit  of  pleasure,  of  self- 
culture  or  devotion  to  some  cherished  pursuit,  the 
unmarried   person   has   an   advantage,    and   hence   it 

'  [An  obvious  gap  in  the  manuscript  occurs  at  this  point,  but  one  which  in 
no  way  affects  the  general  argument  of  the  author. — Editor.] 


PATHOLOGICAL  VARIATION  93 

is  noted  that  marriage  is  either  long  delayed  or 
wholly  avoided.  The  division  of  a  community  along 
narrow  social,  financial,  or  religious  lines  greatly  aids 
this  isolation  by  narrowing  the  selection  of  partners 
for  life.  War,  emigration,  and  the  love  of  adventure 
prompt  the  males  to  desert  remote  and  quiet  local- 
ities, leaving  the  females  in  the  majority  and  imbuing 
the  males  with  a  distaste  for  domestic  pursuits. 
During  the  Crusades  there  were  considerable  areas 
in  Europe  where  there  was  only  one  man  left  to 
seven  women. 

Students  of  psychopathic  conditions  have  pointed 
out  another  and  apparently  growing  cause  of  indif- 
ference to  marriage, — that  sentiment  called  "  homo- 
sexuality," an  inversion  of  the  sexual  instinct  toward 
one's  own  sex.  This  may  be  innocent  in  action  and 
emotion,  when  it  means  merely  the  preference  for 
friendship  in  the  same  gender  and  a  congenital  in- 
difference to  sexual  feelings  ;  or  it  may  progress  to 
any  degree  of  monosexual  devotion,  such  as  classic 
tradition  attributed  to  the  characters  of  Sappho  and 
Heliogabalus. 

Whatever  the  cause  which  leads  to  the  presence 
of  many  old  bachelors  and  spinsters  in  a  community, 
it  must  be  condemned  by  the  anthropologist,  because 
it  is  certain  to  bring  about  mental  deterioration  of 
the    stock  ;    and   the    higher   the    motive,   the    more 


94  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

exalted  the  reason  offered  for  such  abstention,  the 
surer  is  the  deterioration,  because  it  means  that  the 
class  capable  of  such  superior  motives  will  be  extin- 
guished in  the  community. 

{d)  Licentiousness; Divorce. — No  one  will  need  to  be 
persuaded  that  open  licentiousness,  the  disregard  of 
those  sentiments  and  principles  which  attach  in  last- 
ing unions  persons  of  opposite  sex,  can  have  other 
than  a  detrimental  effect  on  individual  and  national 
cliaracter.  Wherever  this  has  prevailed,  the  com- 
munity has  been  weakened  and  its  powers  misdi- 
rected. Any  stimulus  to  the  sex-feeling  beyond  that 
for  its  physiological  purpose^etracts  from  the  general 
energy,  physical  and  mental ;  and  any  indulgence  of 
it  jn  other  than  physiological  methods  develops 
degenerative  tendencies. 


Sexual  psychopathy    has    been  abundantly  invest- 


igated  oT  late  years  by  Krafft-Ebing,  Ellis,  and  other 
stu?ents,'and  its  prevalence  is  too  extended  for  it  not 
to  have  profound  effect  on  the  ethnic  mind.  What 
IS  one  of  the  worst  features  is  the  attraction  that  such 
psychopathic  subjects  have  for  each  other,  whether  of 
the  same  or  opposite  sexes.  It  thus  becomes  an  in- 
herited trait,  and  in  a  majority  of  the  cases  this  is 
easily  recognised. 

The  question  here  arises,  to  what  extent  in  a  com- 
munity the  marriage  tie  may  be  relaxed  without  in- 


PATHOLOGICAL   VARIATION  95 

jury  to  or  to  the  advantage  of  the  general  psychical 
welfare.  This  practical  inquiry  should  be  decided 
not  by  religious  or  social  prejudice,  but  by  a  study  of 
the  peculiar  conditions  of  the  community  and  of  the 
application  of  general  principles  to  them. 

It  is  impossible  for  me  here  to  enter  into  this  vast 
and  vital  question  ;  but  some  of  these  general  princi- 
ples may  be  briefly  stated. 

Students  of  primitive  conditions  have  reached  the 
conclusion  that  neither  sex  in  the  human  species  is 
inclined  to  permanent  sexual  unions.  They  point 
out  that  among  savage  tribes,  and  indeed  in  various 
advanced  religions,  ceremonies  and  customs  are  in 
vogue  to  expiate  such  attachments  as  contrary  to  the 
divine  ordinances.  They  further  show  that  the  forms 
of  marriag^e  were  instituted  either  for  selfish  sensual 
purposes  on  the  part  of  the  male  or  for  property 
reasons  ;  and  that  in  a  condition  of  freedom  and  ad- 
vanced culture  neither  sex  is  inclined  to  reo^ard  them 
as  durably  binding. 

/With  progressive  enlightenment,  bringing  with  it, 
as  it  must,  the  freedom  of  woman  from  civil  disabili- 
ties, divorces  increase,  and  only  those  marriages  are 
stable  in  which  both  parties  are  satisfied.  The  result 
of  this  is  constantly  beneficial.  Facilit)'  of  separation 
is  a  potent  stimulus  to  connubial  harmony  ;  for  the 
one  most  satisfied  with  the  relation  will  always  strive 


96  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

to  renderit  agreeable  to  the  other,  in  order  to  avoid 
a  dissolution  of  the  tie. 

Licentiousness,  therefore,  is  not  synonymous  with 
loose  marriage  relations,  but  the  reverse. 

(e)  DwnntiHon  of  Natality.-(—l^\\^x^  is  no  more 
certain  sign  of  the  degeneration  of  a  race,  nation,  or 
class  than  a^ecreasinof  birth-rate.  When  it  reaches 
the   point  that  the   deaths  in    its   ranks    exceed   the 


births,  extinction  has  already  begun.      Providing  that 

■*- 

fecundity  continues  normal,  the  onslaughts  of  war, 


famine,  and  pestilence  may  be  remedied  ;  but  when, 
through  agencies  of  any  description,  the  birth-rate 
sensibly  falls  off,  there  is  no  escape  from  destruction. 
This  disaster  may  arise  from  physical,  but  is  generally 
due  to  psychical  causes,  and  therefore  points  distinctly 
to  mental  pathology  in  the  group  where  it  occurs. 
Striking  examples  of  this  have  been  presented  by 


studies  of  the. noble  families  of  Europe.  Placed  in 
positions  where  their  chief  aims  were  amusement, 
self-indulgence,  and  ostentation,  their  best  faculties 
were  allowed  to  rust  and  finally  to  decay,  bringing 
with  this^the  extinction  of  their  lines. 

Researches  in  European  history  show  that  the  en- 
nobledfamilies  of  France,  Germany,  and  England 
have  rarely  survived  the  fifth  generation,  and  not 
more  than  six  per  cent,  are  in  existence  after  three 
hundred  years.     Of  427  English   noble  families,  but 


PATHOLOGICAL  VARIATION  97 

41  were  represented  at  the  beginning  of  the  17th 
century.  The  patrician  famiHes  who  controlled  the 
free  cities  of  the  Middle  Ages  are  now  known  in 
history  only.  Scarcely  a  score  have  outlived  the 
degenerative  agencies  of  wealth,  idleness,  and  in- 
dulgence. 

The  other  extreme  of  the  social  scale  is  equally 
unfriendly  to  productiveness.  It  is  popularly  thought 
that  the  poor  man  has  children  if  he  has  nothing 
else.  But  he  must  not  be  too  poor.  Surgeons  of 
the  Indian  civil  service  have  proved  by  ample  statis- 
tics that  the  famines  which  periodically  ravage  the 
East  bring  in  their  train  widespread  and  lasting  infer- 
tility. Arrest  of  puberty  and  organic  deterioration 
of  the  reproductive  system  are  common  results  of  the 
prolonged  starvation,  and  prevent  child-bearing. 

The  psychic  contrast  between  this  result  and  that 
of  malignant  epidemics  is  marked  and  singular. 
During  and  after  famines  the  feelings  dependent  on 
sex  are  almost  extinguished  ;  while  in  epidemics  of 
acute  diseases,  such  as  plague,  cholera,  and  yellow 
fever,  they  are  notably  exalted,  as  they  are  also  In 
leprosy. 

There  is  also  a  class  of  maladies  known  in  medi- 
cine as  "  dystrophic  "  on  account  of  their  tendency  to 
diminish  virility,  and  thus  both  lessen  the  birth  rate 
and  lead  to  morbid  psychic  states.      Prominent  among 


98  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

these  are  malarial  fevers,  tuberculosis,  and  the  later 
stages  of  alcoholism  and  the  opium  habit.  By  many 
writers  the  inordinate  use  of  tobacco  is  believed  to 


exerta_similar  effect. 

In  modern  life,  notably  in  France  and  the  eastern 
United  states,  there  is  a  very  observable  infecundity 
in  certam  classes,  and  they  the  wealthiest  and  best 
edurratecTTdue  unquestionably  to  intention  on  the  part 
ot  the  married  —  to  purely  psychic  causes,  therefore. 
In  the  "  best  society  "  of  those  localities  two  or  three 
children  to  a  marriage  are  as  many  as  are  wanted  and 
as  many  as  arrive. 

That  this  limitation  is  deliberate,  and  not  the  result 
of  reproductive  debility,  has  been  shown  by  an  appli- 
cation of  the  law  of  sex  at  birth  as  formulated  by 
Dumont.  This  is,  that  when  the  proportion  of  the 
sexes  at  birth  are  as  105  males  to  100  females,  the 
diminished  natality  is  voluntary ;  and  when  it  is  in- 
voluntary, due  to  disease  or  malformations,  this  ratio 
is  always  disturbed. 

As  statistics  prove  that  in  modern  life  two-thirds  of 
the  children  born  alive  never  perpetuate  their  kind, 
through  death,  the  single  life,  sterility,  or  other 
reason,  it  is  plain  that  intentional  limitation  of  off- 
spring to  a  number  less  than  four  means  certain  extinc- 
tion of  the  family. 

3.    Toxic  Agents,  —  The  toxic  agents  of  ethnic  de- 


PATHOLOGICAL   VARIATION  99 

generation  belong  to  two  classes,  stimulant-narcotics 
and  4isease-germs.  The  former  are  voluntarily  con- 
sumed by  the  individual,  the  latter  he  absorbs  through 
exposure  to  msalubrious  conditions.  Both  belong  to 
preventable  causes  of  deterioration. 

Of  the  stimulant-narcotics,  alcohol,  opium,  and  to- 
bacco are  the  most  familiar.  But  they  by  no  means 
exhaust  the  list.  Everywhere  and  at  all  times  man 
has  had  an  intense  craving  for  these  nervines.  Where 
the  Koran  forbids  alcoholic  drinks,  the  Arabs  take 
refuge  in  kief  and  other  species  of  hemp.  The  native 
Mexicans  cull  the  peyotl,  the  Siberians  a  toadstool, 
the  Peruvians  coca. 

The  precise  degree  to  which  these  agents  have 
altered  the  intellectual  and  moral  powers  of  communi- 
ties has  long  been  the  theme  of  controversies. 

This  is  especially  true  of  alcohol.  Professor  La- 
pouge,  certainly  an  unbiassed  observer,  citizen  of  a 
land  where  temperance  societies  are  unknown,  does 
not  hesiTate  to  call  it  "  the  most  formidable  a^ent  of 
degeneration  in  modern  society."  Its  worst  effects 
are  not  the  violence  to  which  it  occasionally  leads  or 
the  frightful  nervous  diseases  which  its  excessive  use 
entails,  but  the  slow  hardening  of  the  "  axis  cylin- 
ders "  in  the  nerve  sheaths,  the  immediate  conse- 
quence of  which  is  permanent  deterioration  of  mental 
activity.      Extended    throughout    a    community,   this 


loo  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

means  a  lessening  of  its  energy  and  of  its  finest 
mental  qualities.  Chronic  alcoholism  of  this  kind 
does  not  materially  shorten  life,  but  it  is  eminently 
transmissible,  and  this  soddens  the  stock.  The  white 
race  is  most  exposed  to  these  mental  and  nervous 
effects  of  alcohol,  while  the  red  and  black  races 
escape  them  in  large  measure. 

The  second  class  of  toxic  agents  affecting  the 
community  at  large  includes  the  various  forms  of 
disease-o:erms.  No  one  can  doubt  the  debilitatinor 
influence  of  malaria  on  the  mental  faculties  of  the 
population  exposed  to  its  poisonous  action.  Vast 
tracts  of  the  earth's  surface  are  by  it  rendered  incapable 
of  sustaining  the  highest  types  of  humanity.  Their 
energy  is  sapped,  their  vitality  lowered,  by  the  in- 
sidious miasm.  No  race  or  nationality  is  immune. 
Though  the  white  race  is  most  liable  to  its  attacks, 
the  African  blacks  are  so  far  from  being  exempt  that 
In  the  more  intense  malarial  districts  of  their  conti- 
nent nearly  one-third  of  the  natives  suffer  from  the 
disease. 

Marsh  poison  Is  usually  confined  to  the  lowlands. 
But  the  mountain  valleys  also  generate  a  noxious 
agent,  most  unfriendly  to  mental  growth.  It  displays 
itself  In  a  threefold  form,  embracing  goitre,  cretinism, 
and  deaf-mutism,  the  three  closely  related  and  bring- 
ing with  them  a  positive  debility  of  psychical  powers. 


PATHOLOGICAL   VARIATION  loi 

The  mountains  have  not  only  been  the  refuge  of  the 
feeble,  escaping  from  the  plains,  but  they  have  worked 
to  render  these  outcasts  feebler  still  by  reducing 
them  in  stature  and  viability.  Goitre  is  not  confined 
to  Alpine  regions,  though  more  prevalent  there.  It 
is  distinctly  hereditary,  and  the  offspring  of  goitrous 
parents  are  predisposed  to  cretinism  and  allied  forms 
of  imbecility.  The  southern  and  western  slopes  of  the 
Alps,  the  Pyrenees,  the  Himalayas,  and  the  Cordil- 
leras are  especially  the  homes  of  this  class  of  diseases. 
/Another  series  of  toxic  agents  which  calls  for  con- 
sideration in  this  connection  are  the  so-called  "  con- 
stitutional diseases."  These  are  contagious  and 
transmissible,  the  poison  of  the  blood  being  handed 
down  from  generation  to  generation. 

The  most  noteworthy  of  these  is  syphilis.  Its  ex- 
treme prevalence  among  lower  classes  of  the  com- 
rnunity  and  in  some  of  the  darker  races  is  a  present 
and  potent  cause  of  their  mental  inferiority.  It  is 
well  known  to  specialists  that  children  born  of  syphi- 
litic parents  are  deficient  in  mental  energy  and 
physical  stamina.  They  are  liable  to  scrofulous 
symptoms  and  tubercular  degenerations,  and  are  de- 
ficient in  ambition  and  love  of  labour. 

Less  widely  distributed,  but  yet  affecting  whole 
communities,  are  ergotism  and  pellagra,  due  to  the 
consumption    of    diseased  grain,  and    leprosy   which 


I02  '        ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 


is  undoubtedly  hereditary  and  vitiates  the  blood  of 
whole  families.  Certain  stocks  are  especially  liable 
to  it,  notably  the  African  blacks  and  next  to  them 
the  Semites,  both  Jews  and  Arabs. 

4.  Mental  Shock.  —  History  presents  many  in- 
structive examples  of  the  destructive  power  of  mental 
shock  on  the  ethnic  mind.  It  is  brought  about  by 
some  great,  sudden,  unexpected  catastrophe,  which 
breaks  asunder  the  associations  or  institutions  in 
which  the  community  has  lived  its  mental  life. 

Such  a  disruption  may  arise  from  an  intensely 
malignant  epidemic,  from  war,  or  from  a  natural 
catastrophe. 

An  example  of  the  first  was  the  frightful  ''black 
death"  which  swept  over  Europe  in  1348-50,  destroy- 
ing nearly  a  fourth  of  the  whole  population.  All  ac- 
counts agree  that  the  despair  and  desperation  which 
accompanied  such  an  unexampled  affliction  showed 
themselves  in  an  abandonment  of  all  restraint,  a  reck- 
less indulgence  in  the  wildest  debaucheries,  an  entire 
disregard  of  social  restrictions.  The  same  is  true  of 
the  "plague  and  famine"  years,  1491-95,  when,  in  the 
words  of  a  medical  historian,  "  the  corruption  of  morals 
reached  a  height  without  parallel  in  ancient  times." 

The  depressing  power  of  sudden  defeat  and  sub- 
jugation has  been  repeatedly  exemplified.  The  "  spirit 
is  broken"  of  the  conquered  people.     Only  by  such  a 


PATHOLOGICAL  VARIATION  103 

profound  mental  depravation  can  we  explain  why 
such  a  warlike  and  numerous  nation  as  the  Aztecs 
sank  Instantly  to  be  the  serfs  of  a  handful  of  white 
conquerors. 

A  writer  on  the  history  of  the  Christian  church 
has  remarked  that  "every  nation  has  Its  peculiar 
heresy."  A  student  of  mental  pathology  might  justly 
add  that  every  nation  has  Its  peculiar  form  of  In- 
sanity. An  irrational  tendency  Is  present  and  active 
in  every  community,  ever  striving  to  gain  the  ascend- 
ancy, and  when  it  succeeds,  as  has  often  been  the 
case  in  history,  It  makes  steadily  for  the  destruction 
and  extinction  of  the  national  existence. 

The  forms  of  mental  alienation  are  as  various  in 
the  collective  as  in  the  individual  mind,  and  as  they 
•are  extensions  of  the  symptoms  seen  in  the  latter,  they 
may  be  classified  on  similar  lines.  I  shall  examine 
them,  therefore,  first  as  they  are  connected  with  in- 
tellectual and  next  with  emotional  disturbances,  in 
accordance  with  the  followlngf  scheme  : 

Ethnic  Psychopathic  Conditions. 
I. — In  the  hitellechial  Life. 

^       ,.  .  c  ^  r  •  f  W   Imbecility. 

1.  Conditions  of  Dehciency  ^  ^  .     . 

(  (0)   Criminality. 

^       ,.  .  ,  ^  .       [{ol)   Delusions. 

2.  Conditions  of  rerversion  i      .    ^^ 

(  (0)   Dominant  Ideas. 


I04  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

II. — /-'/-  the  Emotional  Life. 

n       \'^'  f      ij  rC'^)    Hysteria. 

I.   Conditions      of      Hyper-  I  ^ 


{U)   Exaltation. 
(c)  Destructive   Im- 
pulses. 
{a)   Melancholia 
2.   Conditions    of    Asthenia!  (Depression), 

(passive  sensory  states)     (^)   Neurasthenia 

(Exhaustion). 


sthenia    (active    motors 
states) 


I.  Psychopathic  Conditions  in  the  Intellectual 
Life — i.  Conditions  of  Deficiency. — The  intellect 
of  a  group,  like  that  of  the  individual,  has  its  limits, 
beyond  which  it  is  not  possible  to  educate  it.  This 
Is  conspicuously  seen  in  intellects  below  the  normal, 
such  as  in  feeble-minded  persons.  No  amount  of 
training  can  cure  their  radical  defects  and  make  them 
the  equals  of  their  average  associates.  These  are  in- 
stances of  intellectual  deficiency.  It  may  express  it- 
self either  in  some  degree  of  imbecility  or  in  the 
active  form  of  criminal  habits. 

Another  class  do  not  seem  below  the  average  in 
general  powers,  may,  perhaps,  appear  in  various  di- 
rections above  it  ;  but  they  have  some  twist  or,  ob- 
liquity in  their  mental  make-up  which  separates  them 
from  their  fellows,  usually  to  their  detriment.  In 
cornmon  life  such  persons  are  known  as  "  cranks"  or 


PATHOLOGICAL  VARIATION  105 

**  eccentrics,"  men  of  one  idea  and  paranoiacs.  They 
are  examples  of  intellectual  perversion.  Ethnic 
psychology  can  also  supply  abundant  Instances  of 
this  character. 

{a)  Imbecility.-^To^  say  that  there  are  tribes  or 
whole  peoples  actually:  imbecile  would  perhaps  be 
going  too  far.  Yet  this  has  been  asserted  of  some 
by  competent  observers.  Mr.  Horatio  Hale,  who 
was  among  the  native  blacks  of  Australia,  related 
that  the  Impression  they  produced  on  his  mind  was 
one  of  *'  orreat  natural  obtuseness,  downright  childish- 
ness,  and  imbecility."  The  only  arguments  which 
availed  with  them  were  "  such  as  we  should  use 
towards  a  child  or  a  partial  idiot."  Mr.  Hale  attrib- 
uted this  to  generations  of  semi-starvation  and  mal- 
nutrition, and'vvas'so  convInceH"  of  this  that  he  believed 
the  most  favoured  race  would,  by  similar  conditions, 
be  reduced  to  th^  same  low  intellectual  stage. 

A  prevailing  inability  to  judge  of  evidence  is  com- 
mon among  many  peoples  and  classes,  and  this  Is 
a  marked  sign  of  mental  deficiency.  They  mistake 
associations  of  time  and  place  for  relations  of  cause 
and  effect,  and  their  reasoning  Is  vitiated  In  conse- 
quence. Superstition  is  fostered  by  this  mental 
obliquity.  The  casual  objective  relation  is  mistak- 
enly assumed  as  the  subjective  necessity.  This  is 
especially  common  among  savages,  and  the  illiterate 


io6  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

classes  of  hiofher  culture.  It  is  a  mark  of  mental  in- 
feriority  tending-  to  irrational  action  and  confusion  of 
thought. 

In  civilised  communities  those  of  the  population 
who  are  thus  constituted  form  the  "  dependent " 
class,  incapable  of  making  their  own  living,  and  sup- 
ported either  by  their  families  or  the  state.  They 
may  thus  survive  and  reproduce  their  kind,  but  eth- 
nic groups  afflicted  with  such  intellectual  retardation 
either  perish  or  become  subject  to  those  with  higher 
gifts. 

{U)  Crimznalzty. — Criminality  in  its  common  forms 
must  be  classed  as  a  condition  of  intellectual  de- 
ficiency brought  about  by  one  or  several  of  the  causes 
I  have  already  rehearsed.  It  is  not  necessary,  here, 
to  enter  into  the  discussion  as  to  whether  a  criminal 
is  born  or  made,  nor  do  I  speak  now  of  those  violat- 
ors of  the  law  in  favour  of  a  higher  law,  the  reformers, 
apostles,  martyrs  to  a  faith  and  a  truth  in  advance  of 
their  time  and  place,  nor  of  those  who  have  yielded 
for  a  moment  to  some  mastering  temptation.  I  speak 
of  the  ordinary  criminal  who  for  selfish  ends  habit- 
ually violates  the  usages  of  the  group  in  which  he 
lives,  and  to  this  extent  aims  at  its  destruction. 

This  class  cannot  be  disciplined  into  the  rules 
necessary  to  the  peace  and  welfare  of  the  society  in 
which  they  live.      Researches  on    their   psychology. 


PATHOLOGICAL   VARIATION  107 

_show  them,  as  a  rule,  defective  in  physical  sensibility, 
more  frequently  colour-blind,  mental  instability  is  al- 
ways present,  vanity  is  exaggerated,  the  emotions 
are  violent,  and  the  general  intelligence  is  below  the 
average.  We  must  regard  them  as  pathological, 
rapidly  approaching  a  self-destructive  degree  of  de- 
generation. When  they  are  numerous  in  a  group  it 
is  a  sure  sign  of  its  general  inferiority. 

The  most  advanced  criminologists  of  to-day  have 
returned  to  the  opinion  advocated  a  generation  ago 
by  Quetelet  in  these  words  :  ''  Society  creates  the 
germs  of  all  crimes  which  are  committed.  She  in- 
stigates them,  and  the  criminal  is  merely  the  instru- 
ment of  their  execution." 

Translated  into  other  words,  this  means  that  the 
psychic  traits  of  any  group  are  the  direct  parent  of  its 
anti-social,  self-destructive,  criminal  instincts.  To 
the  extent  that  such  traits  are  remediable  the  body 
politic  is  directly  responsible  for  the  violations  of  its 
own  laws.  If  left  unremedied,  the  ruin  of  the  group 
must  follow. 

2.  Conditions  OF  Perversion. — Alienists  have  fre- 
quent occasion  to  observe  cases  of  mental  disease 
where  all  the  faculties  of  the  mind  seem  intact  and 
equal  to  the  average,  except  that  there  is  a  persistent 
irrational  delusion  on  some  single  point  or  a  few 
points  ;  or  else  the  mind  is  controlled  by  the  insistent 


io8  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

recurrence  of  a  single  idea,  which  obstinately  aims  to 
eovern  the  whole  man.  The  latter  is  known  as  an 
idde  fixe,  a  fixed  or  dominant  idea. 

In  ethnic  psycho-pathology  the  same  conditions 
may  be  constantly  observed,  and  they  react  on  the 
character  and  fate  of  peoples  with  visible  power. 
That  which  passes  under  the  name  of  "  popular  pre- 
judice "  is  an  example.  A  community  will  adopt  an 
opinion,  without  reason,  and  will  not  permit  a  discus- 
sion of  its  merits.  Any  one  not  accepting  it  will  be 
regarded  as  a  public  enemy. 

{a)  Debisions. — In  primitive  conditions  the  most 
common  delusion  is  that  of  the  identity  of  waking 
and  dream-life.  There  is  no  distinction  allowed  in 
the  equal  reality  of  both,  or,  if  any,  it  is  in  favour 
of  the  superiority  of  the  dream-life,  for  in  dreams  the 
person  seems  possessed  of  powers  which  he  loses  on 
awakening.  So  highly  are  dreams  esteemed,  that 
many  savage  tribes  and  many  nations  of  respectable 
culture  have  risked  their  gravest  undertakings  on  the 
interpretation  of  these  visions  of  the  night. 

Such  a  delusion  is,  of  course,  most  contrary  to 
reason  and  good  order.  On  account  of  an  inau- 
spicious dream  a  Brazilian  tribe  will  desert  its  village 
and  its  plantations  ;  while  if  a  Kamchatkan  dreams 
that  he  has  been  given  another  man's  wife,  it  is  held 
necessary  for  public  welfare  that  his  dream  be  realised. 


PATHOLOGICAL   VARIATION  109 

Another  delusion,  deeply  rooted  in  the  philosophy 
of  India  and  which  has  worked  untold  misfortunes  on 
its  peoples,  is  that  of  the  unreality  of  the  distinction 
between  subject  and  object — that  is,  between  thought 
and  the  external  world.  Hence  arose  the  doctrine 
that  real  life  is  mdyd,  an  illusion  or  deception  of  the 
senses,  and  its  aims  and  duties  unworthy  the  con- 
templation of  the  true  philosopher.  The  consequent 
neglect  of  the  practical  duties  of  life  could  not  fail  to 
weaken  the  peoples  who  juggled  with  sound  reason 
in  this  manner. 

A  wonderful  example  of  long-persistent  delusion 
was  the  Crusades.  For  nearly  two  centuries  (1095- 
1289)  the  Christian  nations  of  Europe  neglected 
state  and  domestic  affairs  in  order  to  rescue  the  Holy 
Sepulchre  from  the  hands  of  the  infidels.  v.,Al]- classes, 
from  kings  to  peasants,  fell  a  prey  to  the  same 
obsession.  It  was  accompanied  by  repeated  and 
unmistakable  signs  of  epidemic  manias  and  neuro- 
pathias  unequalled  in  history.  Lykanthropy,  in  which 
the  possessed  howled  and  destroyed  like  wolves,  was 
extremely  common  ;  the  dancing  mania  spread  through 
wide  areas,  forcing  old  and  young  into  wild  gestures 
and  crazy  motions ;  and,  stranger  than  all,  young 
children  were  attacked  with  a  mad  desire  to  leave 
their  homes  and  to  wander  forth  they  knew  not 
whither.     Were  they  prevented,  they  pined  and  died. 


no  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

These  "  children's  crusades  "  began  in  Germany  in 
12 1 2,  extended  through  France,  Switzerland,  and 
Italy,  and  continued  as  late  as  141 8. 

(b)  Dominant  Ideas. — The  weightiest  topic  in  uni- 
versal history  may  possibly  be  the  study  of  dominant 
or  fixed  ideas  in  ethnic  psychology.  A  philosophic 
observer  may  regard  each  nation  as  the  destined 
representative  of  some  one  idea,  which,  when  its 
usefulness  has  ended,  yields  to  others  more  germane 
to  existing  conditions  ;  and  by  the  successive  action 
of  all,  the  progress  of  the  species  is  secured  through 
the  gradual  elimination  of  those  which  are  regressive. 

Certain  it  is  that  in  any  group  the  constituent 
minds  are  con^roHed  at  a  given  time  by  some  one 
idea  common  to  jJL  This  is,  in  one  sense,  a  perver- 
sion of  the  intellect.  The  dominant  idea  assumes 
a  magnitude  out  of  proportion  to  its  actual  value  ; 
and  by  this  disproportion — that  is,  by  the  undue  at- 
tention it  receives,  others,  often  of  equal  or  greater 
value  to  the  group,  are  neglected. 

These  dominant  ideas  form  the  national  ideals, 
after  w^hich  the  Individual  lines  are  consciously  pat- 
terned, and  by  the  practical  application  thus  given, 
add  to  the  cohesion  of  the  group  through  the  uni- 
fication of  Its  members.  Acting  under  natural  laws, 
common  to  organic  forms  as  well  as  to  societies,  these 
ideas  are  the  chief  agents  in  social  selection,  and  thus 


PATHOLOGICAL  VARIATION  in 

control  almost  absolutely  the  traits  and  destinies  of 
nations,  as  has  been  traced  in  a  masterly  manner  by 
Vacher  de  Lapouge. 

Such  ideas  are  easily  recognised  in  a  community. 
A  slight  acquaintance  with  history  and  literature 
teaches  us  that  the  early  Romans  were  exclusively 
possessed  by  the  military  ideal,  the  lust  of  conquest ; 
that  the  ideal  of  the  Israelites  has  always  been  the 
thirst  for  commercial  gain  ;  and  that  art  was  the 
ruling  aim  in  the  palmy  days  of  Greece. 

But  the  finest  example  that  occurs  to  me  of  many 
different  peoples  being  dominated  by  a  fixed  idea  is 
seen  in  the  votaries  of  the  Mohammedan  religion. 
They  are  bound  together  by  one  sacred  language,  in 
which  one  book,  the  Koran,  lays  down  all  law,  civil, 
criminal,  and  ecclesiastical,  and  the  expressed  dicta  of 
which  set  them  in  sharpest  opposition  to  all  who  do 
not  accept  it.  The  religious  idea,  thus  stimulated 
out  of  all  proportion  to  others,  has  developed  in  them 
a  fanatical  force  which  at  one  time  almost  enabled 
them  to  conquer  the  known  world,  and  which  has 
since  resulted  in  the  inevitable  decay  of  their  greatest 
states,  their  literature  and  arts. 

II.  Psychopathic  Conditions  in  the  Emotional 
Life. — Apart  from  the  perversions  of  intelligence 
which  cloud  the  reasoning  faculties  of  nations,  they 
are  subject  to  widespread  and  persistent  disturbances 


112  E  THNIC  PS  YCHOLOG  V 

of  their  emotional  lives,  which  frequently  react  disas- 
trously on  the  common  weal. 

Following  the  division  adopted  by  some  compet- 
ent alienists  in  individual  cases,  I  may  with  propriety 
classify  these  into  two  divisions,  as  they  represent,  on 
the  one  hand,  excessive,  misdirected,  and  morbid 
activity,  or,  on  the  other,  unhealthy  depression  and 
apathy. 

I.  Conditions  of  HvPERSTHENiA.-i^It  is  a  popular 

error  in  scientific  circles  that  diseases  of  the  nervous 

system  increase  with   civilisation.     The    opposite  is 

true.     The    lowest   staofes    of    culture    are   far   more 

pathological   than   the  higher,  in   this,  as  well  as   in 

most  respects.     True  that  certain  neuroses  belong  to 

cultured  peoples  ;    but  morbid  emotional   states  are 

especially  prevalent  in  lower  conditions. 
« ■       -"  -    ^  ~ 

(^)  Hysteria. — This  is  well  illustrated  in  the  his- 
tory of  epidemic  hysteria.  \^Jtjiay  occasionally  be 
seen  among  ourselves  in  a  hospital  ward  or  at  a 
camp-meeting  ;  but  such  outbreaks  are  sporadic. 
They  belong  in  the  ethnic  temperament  of  many 
tribes   of   the    Malayan   and   native  American  races. 

The  Jesuit  fathers  described  in  vivid  colours  such 
outbreaks  among  the  Hurons  of  Canada,  attacking 
whole  villages  and  frequently  leading  to  their  de- 
struction. Father  de  Quen  was  quite  right  when 
he  wrote  :  "  The  old  saying  alleges  that  every  man  has 


PATHOLOGICAL   VARIATION  113 

a  grain  of  madness  In  his  composition  ;  but  this  is  a 
tribe  where  each  has  half  an  ounce."  He  correctly 
regarded  them  as  in  a  permanently  pathological  state. 

Quite  similar  recitals  are  preserved  of  such  out- 
breaks among  the  Guaranis  of  Paraguay,  and  other 
primitive  stocks,  notably  the  Malay  peoples. 

From  the  accounts  of  travellers  it  would  seem, 
contrary  to  what  we  might  suppose,  that  such  ex- 
cessive nervous  sensibility  is  peculiarly  present  In 
extreme  northern  latitudes,  while  tropical  tribes 
are  much  more  liable  to  conditions  of  depression. 
Castren,  who  lived  long  among  the  northern  Sibiric 
tribes,  dwells  with  astonishment  on  their  nervous 
sensitiveness.  A  sudden  blow  on  the  outside  of  the 
skin  yurt  will  throw  its  occupants  into  spasms. 

Amoncr    these    "  neuroses    of    excitement "    which 

o 

at  timesseize  upon  the  souls  of  communities, 
none  is  more  inexplicable,  and  none  more  fraught 
with  consequences  to  world-history  than  the  goad- 
ing: restlessness  which  has  driven  slno^le  tribes  or 
groups'"'uf  Liibes  into  aimless  roving.  *^his  Wan 
derlusl  arises  as  an  emotional  epidemic,  not  by 
a  process  of  reasoning.  It  drives  communities  from 
fixed  seats  and  comfortable  homes,  transforming 
them  int^  migratory  and  warring  hordes. 

{b)  Exaltation. — Under  the  heading  of  exaltation 
of  nervous    Impulse   the   alienist   includes   a   morbid 


c 


114  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

devotion  to  sexual  thoughts  and  acts  (erotomania  )  ; 
,<^  to  vanity,  ambition,  and  self-magnification  ;  and  those 
states  of  megalomania  where  the  patient  is  subject 
to  delusions  of  greatness,  iddes  de  grandeur. 

"To  alt  of  these  we  may  easily  find  parallels  in 
ethnic  life.  They  have  all  their  analogies  in  tribal 
or  national  history,  with  consequences  as  disastrous 
as  they  disclose  in  the  individual. 

No  more  positive  examples  of  erotic  mania  could 
be  found  in  an  asylum  than  those  presented  by  the 
whole  of  some  Polynesian  tribes.  The  life  of  both 
sexes  was  devoted  chiefly  to  the  pleasures  of  the 
orenital  nerves.  Societies  were  formed  where  such 
practices  were  developed  into  arts  ;  children  before 
maturity  were  initiated  into  them  ;  and  no  mode  of 
excitement,  unnatural  though  it  might  be,  was 
omitted  or  shunned. 

The  destructive  results  of  such  licentiousness  in 
the  history  of  these  tribes,  already  extinct  or. nearly 
so,  need  not  be  insisted  upon.  But  why  seek  to 
demonstrate  it  from  remote  times  or  savagfe  lands  ? 
Within  a  year  a  philosophic  student,  from  a  wide 
range  of  investigation,  has  attributed  chiefly  to  the 
same  pathological  cause  the  deterioration  of  the  lead- 
ing so-called  Latin  nations  of  Europe  in  the  last  two 
centuries.  In  them,  says  Signor  G.  Ferrero,  the  sex 
impulse    develops    earlier,    and    absorbs    and   wastes 


PATHOLOGICAL   VARIATION  115 

the  life  energies  more  than  in  the  Teutonic  nations, 
yielding  to  the  latter  the  superior  place  in  the 
struggle  for  existence. 

Another  and  familiar  exemplification  of  this  neuro- 
pathic frame  of  the  ethnic  mind  is  that  exaggerated 
national  boastfulness  known  (from  a  soldier  under 
Bonaparte)  as  Chauvinism,  It  is  patriotism  passed 
into  mild  dementia  ;  so  well  known  that  it  has  a 
special  name  in  English  also,  Jingoism.  The  pro- 
found conviction  that  our  own  country — whichever 
that  may  be — is  the  greatest  in  the  world,  leader  of 
all  in  intelligence,  power,  culture,  and  vigour,  is  in- 
variably and  everywhere  a  mental  delusion,  a  type  of 
megalomania.  Such  a  notion  prepares  the  way  for 
increase  of  ignorance  and  self-esteem  so  blind  that  it 
is  sure  ere  long  to  fall  in  the  pit  ever  open  for  fools. 

(r)  Destructive  Impulse.  The  passion  for  wanton 
destruction  may  seize  equally  upon  a  person  or 
group. ,  It  may  be  directed  toward  inanimate  objects 
or  against  human  life.  John  Addington  Symonds 
gives  a  thrilling  sketch  of  the  monster,  Ezzelino  da 
Romano,  Vicar  of  the  Emperor  Frederick  II.,  in 
northern  Italy  (about  1250).  His  own  passion  was 
the  mutilation,  torture,  and  murder  of  men,  women, 
and  children.  His  inordinate  cruelty  and  repeated 
massacres  led  to  his  becoming  the  hero  of  a  fiendish 
cycle  in  Italian  literature. 


1 1 6  ETHNIC  PS YCHOLOG V 

We  may  call  him,  if  we  wish  to  palliate  his  mon- 
strous deeds,  a  monomaniac  ;  but,  as  Symonds  says, 
if  we  thus  excuse  him  **  we  shall  have  to  place  how 
many  Visconti,  Sforzeschi,  Malatesti,  Borgias,  Far- 
nesi,  etc.,  in  the  list  of  maniacs?"  No,  it  was  an 
ethnic  tendency  of  Italy  at  that  period,  and  for  long 
afterwards,  and  could  be  illustrated  by  scores  of 
traits  from  popular  as  well  as  princely  life. 

The  mania  for  murder  which  seized  the  Parisian 
populace  in  1793  was  a  true  pathological  outburst. 
No  sense  of  patriotism  thrilled  the  crowds  who  ran 
by  the  tumbrils  and  surrounded  the  guillotines.  It 
was  hsematomania,  the  blood-madness,  that  was  upon 
them. 

The  suicidal  impulse  occasionally  assumes  an 
epidemic  form  which  arises  from  conditions  of  the 
ethnic  life.  The  aborigines  of  Cuba  when  enslaved 
by  the  Spanish  conquerors  practised  self-destruction 
on  a  scale  which  contributed  much  to  their  prompt 
extinction.  In  the  city  of  Frankfort-on-the-Main  in 
the  last  century  suicide  became  so  frequent  among 
women  that  the  dead  bodies  were  suspended  by  the 
feet  in  order  to  check  the  impulse  in  the  survivors. 

In  a  less  degree  the  destructive  passion  directed 
against  objects,  or  figuratively  against  institutions, 
known  as  zconoc/asm,  is  often  a  mere  outburst  of  un- 
reasoning  emotion.      Its  energy   is   misdirected   and 


PATHOLOGICAL  VARIATION  117 

fruitless.  What  was  the  result  of  that  which  durincr 
the  eighth  and  ninth  centuries  raged  in  Constantinople 
and  Asia  Minor?  It  altered  image-worship  into 
picture-worship,  nothing  more. 

2.  Conditions  of  AsTHENiAi::Jn  contrast  to  the  re- 
peated explosions  of  nerve  force  which  give  rise  to 
the  active  motor  statesT^of  ethnic  dementia  I  have 
been  considering,  are  those  characterised  by  a  loss  of 
reaction  to  stimuli,  by_|2assive,  merely  sensory, 
conditions.  J 

These  are  of  two  varieties,  well  marked  in  their 
differences,  each  highly  significant  in  its  ethnological 
and  historic  relations.  The  one  is  allied  to  melan- 
cholia, being  marked  by  depression  or  inaction  of  the 
psychic  forces,  the  other  by  their  exhaustion,  by  in- 
capacity for  reaction  to  ordinary  stimuli. 

{a)  Melancholia. — The  consequence  of  mental 
shock,  I  have  already  pointed  out,  is  to  bring  about 
a  sort  of  mental  paralysis,  a  listless,  apathetic  state  ; 
and  this  I  have  illustrated  by  some  examples. 

A  touching  one  is  recorded  of  the  Greek  colony 
which  erected  the  city  of  Paestum  on  the  Tyrrhenian 
Sea,  whose  stately  ruins  still  attract  thousands  of 
visitors  annually. 

A  clearly  ethnic  type  of  melancholia  is  nostalgia 
or  homesickness.  Of  course  it  is  found  in  some 
degree  in  all  lands,  but  with  some  peoples,  notably 


ii8  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

dwellers  in  high  northern  latitudes,  the  Lapps  and 
Eskimo,  it  is  severe  and  general.  If  removed  from 
their  surroundings  they  mope  and  die. 

{B)  A"c2irasthe7iia. — Diseases  of  nervous  and  mental 
exhaustion  belong  exclusively  among  nations  of  ad- 
vanced culture.  There  are  those  which  have  not 
— ^w 

merely  increased,  most  of  them  have  originated  in 
stages  of  high  civilisation  ;  not,  as  some  have  falsely 
arcrued,  from  conditions  essential  to  culture,  but  to 
errors  and  misdirections  in  that  culture.  As,  in  all 
rapid  motions,  slight  deviations  entail  more  serious 
consequences  than  when  motion  is  slow,  so,  in  the 
rapid  progress  of  modern  times,  slight  neglects  of 
hygiene  bring  about  more  serious  results  than  in 
ruder  countries. 


This  explains  the  relative  Increase  of  some  forms 
of  insanity,  of  suicide  and  criminality,  and  the  appear- 
ance  ot  new  maladies,  such  as  progressive  paralysis, 
in  civilised  centres.  They  are  due  to  exhaustion  of 
the  nerve  centres  in  those  who  are  not  adapted  to 
bear  the  strain  of  contemporary  competitive  life,  or 
who,  if  able,  fail  to  direct  their  activities  in  successful 
channels. 


Another  evidence  of  exhaustion,  one  which  properly 
exercises  the  attention  of  the  student  of  modern  life, 
is  the  progressive  distaste  for  the  sex  relation,  es- 
pecially  "among  women.     The   consequences  of    this 


PATHOLOGICAL   VARIATION  119 

mental  attitude  are  the  prevalence  of  spinsterhood 
and  the  limitation  of  families  in  marriage,  to  which  I 
have  already  referred.  The  attraction  of  the  **  higher 
culture"  and  of  their  new  facilities  for  seeing  and 
enjoying  liberty  have  led  to  atrophy  of  the  maternal 
instinct  and  of  the  desire  of  marriaofe.  This  can  have 
but  one  result,  —  the  diminution  and  final  extinction 
of  the  group  in  which  it  prevails. 

There  is  also  such  an  ethnic  malady  as  moral  ex- 
haustion. After  a  period  of  intense  but  ill-regulated 
ethical  ^thusiasm  there  often  follows  a  reaction,  when 


ail  ethical  principles  are  thrown  to  the  winds.  This 
has  been  plausibly  explained  by  Dr.  Laycock  as  an 
overstimulation  of  the  brain  cells  most  closely  con- 
nected with  this  class  of  sentiments,  with  consequent 
exhaustion  in  transmission  to  the  next  generation. 
"  The  fathers  have  eaten  sour  grapes  and  the  children's 
teeth  are  set  on  edge." 

The  bigotry  of  Puritan  England  in  the  17th  cent- 
ury was  followed  by  the  laxity  of  the  Restoration. 


in 

<: 


5^ 


PART  II 

THE  NATURAL  HISTORY  OF  THE  ETHNIC  MIND 


121 


INTRODUCTION 

\  LTHOUGH,  as  we  have  seen,  there  is  no  com- 
^^  mon  measure  of  Mind  and  Matter,  the  con- 
nections between  the  two  are  so  intimate  that,  in 
organised  beings,  any  change  in  the  one  entails  a 
corresponding  change  in  the  other. 

This  is  a  principle  which  has  long  been  accepted 
in  the  Science  of  Man.  A  quarter  of  a  century  ago 
Professor  Schaffhausen  expressed  it  in  these  words  : 
"  One  of  the  weightiest  doctrines  in  Anthropology 
is  the  constant  correlation  between  intellectual  cap- 
acity and  physical  organisation."  L-Xhat  branch  of 
Anthropology  called  Somatology  is  devoted  to  the 
investigation  of  the  h_uman  body,  its  measurements, 
structure,  and  functions,  as  they  differ  in  individuals, 
groups,  and  races,  for  the  purpose  of  defining  and 
explaining  this  correlation.  V 

The  expressions  of  the  individual  mind  are  largely 
the  reflex  of  its  environment,  of  the  external  im- 
pulses, stimuli,  and  conditions  which  surround  it. 
These    are    physical,    measurable,    quantitative,    and 

123 


VJ 
N. 


124  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

therefore    within     the    province     of    the    "natural" 
sciences. 

In  their  relation  to  the  individual,  they  mostly  be- 
long to  the  domain  of  "  experimental  "  psychology  ; 
but  as  they  influence  the  group  and  decide  its  con- 
stitution they  form  an  important  branch  of  ethnic 
psychology  also. 

The  natural  history  of  the  Mind  is  chiefly  the 
study  of  its  environments,  its  milieu.  But  that  term 
is  to  be  taken  in  its  widest  sense. 

The  nearest  environment  of  my  mind  is  my  body. 
Indeed,  it  is  the  only  environment  of  which  I  have 
positive  knowledge.  As  John  Stuart  Mill  well  said, 
"  I  know  my  own  feelings  with  a  higher  certainty  than 
I  know  aught  else." 

Hence  the  physical  constitution  of  the  individual 
is  that  which  has  primary  importance. 
y  That  may  be  considered  first  as  an  individual 
question,  without  going  beyond  the  circumstances  of 
the  personal  life  and  health,  a  purely  somatic  invest- 
igation.  We  may  next  inquire  how  many  of  his 
peculiarities  the  individual  owes  to  his  ancestors, 
which  will  bring  up  the  questions  of  heredity,  hy- 
bridity,  and  others,  including  mental  as  well  as 
physical  traits.  His  debt  is  large  to  these,  but  still 
larger,  say  some  writers,  to  his  contemporaries,  the 
associates   with    whom    he    has    been    thrown    from 


INTRODUCTION  125 

birth.  These  are  his  "  people,"  the  "  group  "  of  which 
he  is  a  member.  He  is  modified  in  a  thousand  ways 
by  this  "demographic"  environment. 

All  these — his  ancestors,  fellows,  and  his  own  body  _ 
— are  "human"  influences.  Beyond  them  lies  the 
great  world  of  other  beings  and  of  unconscious  forces, 
the  animals  and  plants,  the  land  and  water,  the  clime 
and  spot,  which  make  up  his  "geographic"  environ- 
ment. How  dependent  is  he  upon  these  !  How 
utterly  they  often  control  his  thoughts  and  actions  ! 

Each  of  these  I  shall  endeavour  to  estimate  in  their 
influence  on  the  individual,  not  as  an  individual,  but 
as  a  member  of  a  group  ;  and  on  the  group  itself,  as 
an  independent,  psychic  entity,  nowise  identical  in 
character  with  any  individual. 


CHAPTER  I 

THE    INFLUENCE    OF   THE  SOMATIC  EN- 
VIRONMENT 

T^HE  human  body  is  an  *' organism"  each  part  of 
which  is  in  vital  relation  to  the  whole,  and  is  influ- 
enced by  the  condition  of  every  other  part.  This  is 
true  of  function  as  well  as  structure,  for  function,  after 
all,  is  merely  the  term  we  give  to  structure  in  action. 
Mentality,  psychical  activity,  is  a  function,  and,  like 
all  others,  is  organically  conditioned  by  the  whole 
organism  and  its  several  parts.  To  understand  the 
influence  of  the  body  on  the  mind,  therefore,  we 
should  consider  in  such  relation  each  of  the  physio- 
logical ''  systems  "  which  make  up  the  organic  life. 
For  my  present  purpose,  however,  it  will  be  sufficient 
to  select  those  most  closely  related  to  mental  activity. 
The  Brain. — The  learned  of  all  times  have  sought 
to  find  "  the  seat  of  the  soul."  Primitive  men  gener- 
ally placed  it  in  the  liver  or  in  the  heart ;  but  anatom- 
ists have  been  long  agreed  that  it  must  be  somewhere 

in  the  head.     The  latest  word  from  them  is  that  it 

126 


y 

SOMA  TIC  ENVIRONMENT  1 2  7 

resides  in  the  nerve  cells  of  the  grey  matter  of  the 
brain,  in  the  number  and  activity  of  the  "  pyramid- 
neurons  "  there  situate,  and  probably  in  their  capacity 
to  send  out  shoots  or  branches. 

This  intimate,  ultimate,  structure  and  potency  es- 
tablishes the  difference  between  the  intellectual  facul- 
ties of  species  and  individuals.  In  the  lower  animals 
these  cells  are  few  and  scattered,  and  their  prolifera- 
tions short  and  simple.  In  man  the  cells  increase  in 
number  and  their  extensions  become  lonof  and  com- 
plex.  They  are  more  abundant  when  the  grey  matter 
is  ample,  as  is  the  case  where  the  convolutions  are 
intricate. 

Up  to  a  recent  period  it  was  supposed  that  the 
weight  or  size  of  the  brain  was  the  chief  physical  ele- 
ment in  mental  superiority.  It  is  now  known,  that 
has  little  to  do  with  it.  Not  a  few  men  of  distin- 
guished parts,  such  as  Liebig,  Gambetta,  Tiedemann, 
etc.,  have  had  brains  decidedly  below  the  average  in 
weight,  while,  on  the  other  hand,  many  with  large 
brains  have  led  unimportant  lives.  This  is  also  the 
case  with  races,  for  although  the  African  negro  is 
below  the  European  in  his  cranial  capacity,  the  Fue- 
gian,  decidedly  below  the  African  in  mental  develop- 
ment, has  a  brain  larger  than  either  of  the  other  races. 
Obviously,  both  the  cubical  content  and  weight  of  the 
brain  depend  much  on  the  general  size,  stature,  and 


128  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

weight  of  the  body  ;  and  no  one  has  been  found  who 
pretends  that  the  biggest  man  is  also  the  ablest. 

We  are  almost  compelled,  therefore,  to  accept  as 
correct  the  conclusion  reached  by  Lapouge  and  others, 
that  not  the  size  but  the  molecular  constitution  of  the 
brain  is  finally  decisive  of  intellectual  power;  and  this 
is  a  trait  which  up  to  the  present  time  has  eluded 
analysis. 

This  is  not  inconsistent  with  holding  that  where 
other  proportions  are  the  same,  a  larger,  more  com- 
plex brain  is  generally  significant  of  higher  mental 
powers  ;  and  that  a  well-balanced  skull,  with  ortho- 
gnathic features  and  moderate  facial  development, 
are  indications  favourable  for  the  psychical  possessions 
of  the  individual  or  the  group. 

The  shape  would  seem  to  be  more  significant  than 
the  weight  of  the  brain.  Of  all  the  elements  of  gross 
cerebral  anatomy  it  appears  to  be  that  most  indicative 
of  mental  power. 

This  is  a  recent  discovery  of  craniologists,  the  en- 
tire meaning  of  which  has  not  yet  been  worked  out. 
It  is  due  to  the  researches  of  Ammon  and  Lapouge 
within  the  last  decade,  and  to  the  anthropologist 
promises  solutions  of  various  obscure  problems  in  the 
cultural  growth  of  the  species. 

These  observers  have  ascertained,  by  many  thou- 
sand measurements  on  the  living  and  the  dead,  that 


SOMA  TIC  ENVIRONMENT  1 2 9 

those  persons  who,  as  a  class,  are  best  adapted  to  the 
high  and  continued  strain  of  modern  city  and  com- 
petitive Hfe,  have  skulls  in  that  shape  termed  "  sub-  _ 
dolichocephalic,"  which  means  that  their  brains  have 
a  prevailing  and  fixed  spatial  relation  of  their  parts, 
a  relation,  no  doubt,  which  is  the  most  favourable  to 
the  general  and  prolonged  activity  of  those  nerve 
cells  which  we  know  are  the  seat  of  psychical  func- 
tion. 

Such  persons  in  youth  stand  at  the  head  in  the 
school,  they  take  the  prizes  in  examinations,  they 
carry  off  the  honours  in  intellectual  contests,  they  are 
leaders  in  the  learned  professions,  they  are  the  self- 
created  **  upper  class,"  and,  what  is  equally  note- 
worthy, in  the  unhealthy  atmosphere  of  great  cities 
they  outlive  their  associates  with  other  shapes  of 
brain. 

But  these  observers  also  note  that  while  these 
somewhat  long-skulled  persons  have  such  intellectual 
and  even  physical  advantages  in  the  struggle  for 
existence,  they  are  deficient  in  others,  which,  under 
some  circumstances,  are  even  more  necessary  to 
success. 

The  same  extended  series  of  measurements  and 
comparisons  show  that  those  whose  brains  are 
rounder  in  form — -more  brachycephalic — prove  gen- 
erally superior  in  technical  skill,  in  industry,  and  in 


I30  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

perseverance.  They  are  less  adventurous,  they  lack 
Imagination  and  the  stimulus  of  the  ideal,  they  are 
narrow  and  formalists ;  but  they  shine  in  the  bour- 
geois virtues  of  capacity  for  steady  work,  of  devotion 
to  hearth  and  home,  in  respect  for  settled  government, 
stable  laws,  and  ancestral  institutions. 
(  This  favourable  brain  shape  is,  in  Europe,  often  cor- 
related with  the  blonde  type,  light  hair,  and  grey  or 
blue  eyes  ;  but  whether  this  is  anything  more  than  a 
local  peculiarity  remains  in  doubt. 

Ammon  has  pointed  out,  however,  that  these  traits, 
where  they  have  been  united  in  history,  have  marked 
a  daring,  energetic,  progressive  stock,  one  fertile  in 
bold  explorers,  conquerors,  and  thinkers.  _Such  was 
the  type  of  the  ancient  Aryans,  who  became  the  ruling 
race  wherever  they  carried  their  victorious  standard, 
*'not  through  numbers,  longevity,  or  fertility,  but 
through  the  consequences  of  '  natural  selection.'  " 
Professor  Lapouge  has  further  shown  that  in  southern 
France,  where  the  local  aristocracy  rose  from  the 
same  stock  as  the  peasantry  by  superior  personal 
ability,  a  notable  difference  is  observable  between  the 
skull-shapes  of  the  two  classes,  the  crania  of  the 
"  gentlemen  "  being  considerably  longer  in  proportion 
to  width  than  those  of  the  peasantry. 

They  are  well  suited  for  village  life  and  agricult- 
ural  occupations ;    but,   subjected  to   the   stress  and 


SOMA  TIC  ENVIRONMENT  1 3  r 

Strain    of    great    cities,     they   die    out    in    the    third 
ofeneration.^ 

When  it  is  remembered  that  whole  nations,  stocks, 
races,  are  characterised  by  the  prevalence  of  one  or 
other  of  these  skull-forms,  it  is  at  once  seen  that  a 
physical  basis  is  here  presented  for  ethnic  psychology 
worthy  of  attentive  study.  These  authors  have,  in 
fact,  applied  their  conclusions  in  this  direction  ;  but, 
concerning  themselves  chiefly  with  the  mixed  popula- 
tions of  European  states,  have  been  principally  occu- 
pied with  the  "  social  selections  "  which  may  be  attained 
in  such  communities  from  this  cause. 

While  the  skull-form  thus  becomes  distinctive  of 
brains  possessing  or  lacking  certain  faculties,  it  must 
not  be  supposed  that  this  relation  is  an  essential  one. 
The  brain  will  perform  its  work  without  reference  to 
the  shape  of  the  skull.  This  is  proved  by  the  many 
tribes  who  have  artificially  deformed  the  head  in  obedi- 
ence to  fashion  or  superstition.  In  America  it  is 
noteworthy  that  the  crania  thus  malformed  to  the  ut- 
most degree  are  precisely  those  of  the  nations  of  the 
highest  civilisation — the  Mayas  of  Central  America 
and  the  Quechuas  of  Peru. 

•  These  deductions  were  based  on  many  thousand  observations  in  France, 
Switzerland,  and  Germany,  and  are  undoubtedly  true  for  the  places  and  periods 
in  whicli  they  were  conducted  ;  but  it  has  not  been  shown  that  they  are  gener- 
ally applicable  in  other  areas.  Some  observers  (Livi,  Lombroso)  have  not 
accepted  them  for  Italy.  The  opposition  they  have  met  in  France  from 
Fouillee  and  others  is  merely  sentimental. 


132  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

The  N'crvoiis  System. — Professor  Haeckel,  in  his 
lectures  on  '*  anthropogeny,"  lays  down  the  maxim, 
"All  soul-functions  or  psychical  activities  depend 
directly  on  the  structure  and  composition  of  the  nerv- 
ous system."  This  is  illustrated  by  the  biological 
development  of  the  nerves  of  special  sense,-^of  sight, 
hearing,  taste,  and  smell.  Originally  they  were  all 
indifferent  touch-nerves,  and  by  slow  degrees  in  in- 
definite time  developed  their  specific  reactions. 

They  are  yet  by  no  means  the  same  in  all  persons, 
as  everyone  knows.  They  also  differ  widely  in  groups, 
nations,  and  races.  The  study  of  the  *'  reaction- 
times  "  of  the  principal  races  has  occupied  Cattell, 
Bache,  and  other  psychologists.  The  sense  of  taste  is 
notably  different.  An  Eskimo  finds  pleasure  in  castor 
oil  and  a  Kamchatkan  in  eating  rotten  fish.  The 
Annamite  is  almost  insensible  to  pain  from  wounds, 
but  suffers  intensely  from  moderate  cold  and  is 
acutely  affected  by  odours.  The  Fuegian  can  sleep 
naked  on  the  snow  with  comfort,  but  is  easily  disturbed 
by  noises. 

The  intellectual  differences  between  both  individu- 
als and  races  arise  not  so  much  from  relative  mental 
capacity  as  from  varying  reaction  to  mental  stimuli. 
They  all  have  pretty  much  the  same  power  to  pursue 
knowledge,  if  they  choose  to  exert  it.  The  difference 
is  one  involving  the  general  nerve-tracts.     Perception 


SOMA  TIC  EN  VIRONMENT  1 33 

and  attention  were  the  forces  which  in  the  history  of 
organisms  developed  all  the  special  senses  from  nerves 
of  touch  ;  and  the  growth  of  the  intellect  is  conse- 
quently closely  conditioned  by  the  qualities  of  nerve- 
sensations. 

The  Osseo2LS  System. — To  be  asked  to  define  the 
ethnic  life  of  a  group  from  the  bones  exhumed  in  its 
cemeteries  would  seem  a  hopeless  task.  Yet  it  is 
possible,  for  on  the  osseous  system  the  whole  bodily 
structure  is  built  up,  and  the  activity  of  the  brain  is 
conditioned. 

Races  differ  in  their  skeletons.  That  of  the  African 
black  is  heavy,  the  flat  bones  thick,  the  pelvis  narrow, 
and  presents  many  peculiarities  which  are  termed 
"  pitTiecoid"  or  ape-like.  Contrasting  with  these  are 
small-boned,  delicately  formed  skeletons  of  the  Indo- 
nesians and  Japanese,  resembling  those  of  the  female 
in  other  stocks.  It  would  not  be  difficult  to  brinor  the 
ethnic  into  relation  to  these  skeletal  traits. 

Professor  Herve,  of  the  School  of  Anthropology  of 
Paris,  has  argued  that  the  presence  of  the  "  Wormian 
bones  "  and  the  complexity  of  the  cranial  sutures  are 
a  measure  of  the  rapidity  of  brain-development,  and 
consequently  a  criterion  of  mental  activity  in  a  stock. 
This  can  scarcely  be  accepted,  for  we  are  not  sure 
that  the  rapidity  of  bone-formation  bears  any  ratio  to 
the  growth  of  the  brain  cells  ;    but  it  is  not  rash  to 


134  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

argue  that  a  people  whose  bones  are  largely  diseased 
must  have  lived  in  unhygienic  conditions,  and  had 
become  degenerate  in  mind  as  well  as  body. 

Such  is  the  case  with  the  skeletons  of  that  wholly 
unknown  tribe  who  once  densely  peopled  the  Salt 
River  valley  in  Arizona,  and  of  those  who  dwelt  near 
the  great  cemetery  of  Ancon  in  Peru.  About  one- 
third  of  the  skeletons  present  pathological  features 
indicatinof  lonor-continued  defective  nutrition  or  wide- 
spread  disease.  No  wonder  that  both  stocks  perished 
off  the  earth.  Though  at  one  time  singularly  ad- 
vanced, they  had  sunk  into  complete  degeneracy. 

Muscular  System  ;  Height  and  Weight. — There  is 
a  relation  between  height,  weight,  and  mental  power, 
true  for  the  individual  and  the  group.  This  is  not 
mysterious,  as  all  three  depend  upon  nutrition.  Phys- 
iologists lay  down  ratios  of  height,  weight,  and  age 
which  are  requisite  to  the  highest  health,  mental  and 
physical. 

We  may  go  further,  and  say  that  any  marked  aber- 
ration from  the  average  of  the  species  in  these  respects 
is  accompanied  by  some  equally  noticeable  psychical 
peculiarity.  Dwarfs  have  often  acute  minds,  but 
rarely  deep  affections. 

Inferior  stature  is  often  an  ethnic  trait.  The  cen- 
tral African  pygmies,  the  Lapps,  and  the  Bushmen 
are  familiar  examples.     Mr.  Haliburton  has  recorded 


SOMA  TIC  ENVIRONMENT  1 35 

others  in  the  Atlas  and  Pyrenean  mountains ;  and 
Dr.  Colhgnon  reports  the  diminution  in  hei<^ht  in 
some  districts  of  central  France. 

The  explanation  of  all  is  the  same — lack  of  proper, 
regular,  and  sufficient  alimentation.  They  are,  as  the 
Germans  say,  Kilmnierformen,  products  of  wretched- 
ness. The  shortest  of  the  Bushmen  are  also  the 
most  miserable — those  living  amid  the  barren  sands 
of  the  Kalihari  desert. 

The  reaction  of  such  prolonged  semi-starvation  on 
the  functions  of  the  brain  cells  leads  to  psychical 
dwarfishness.  None  of  these  undersized  stocks  have 
gained  a  position  in  history  or  contributed  to  the 
culture  of  humanity.  They  have  been  unequal  in 
physical  strife,  and  have  been  forced  to  the  wall. 

Reproduction. — The  reproductive  function  in  its 
various  manifestations  exerts  an  enormous  influence 
on  the  individual  mind,  and  exhibits  broad  racial  and 
ethnic  distinctions.  Its  power  is  scarcely  less  operat- 
ive in  the  fate  of  nations  than  of  persons,  and  its 
reflection  in  the  mind  of  groups  deserves  closest 
attention. 

The  period  of  puberty  changes  widely  the  direction 
of  the  thoughts,  and  the  character  frequently  under- 
goes a  complete  transformation.  Children  previously 
studious  lose  interest  in  their  lessons,  while  others 
pursue  them  with  greatly  increased  devotion.     The 


136  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

sexual  emotions,  which  mark  the  epoch,  may  absorb 
the  whole  being  or  merely  stimulate  it  to  higher 
efforts. 

The  age  at  which  puberty  begins  varies,  following 
the  general  law  that  the  higher  the  annual  tempera- 
ture the  earlier  in  life  does  the  chanofe  set  in.  This 
becomes  of  psychical  interest  when  it  is  added  that 
the  earlier  the  change  the  more  intense  and  permeat- 
ing are  the  erotic  passions  ;  the  more  do  they  compel 
to  their  sway  the  other  emotions  and  the  intellect. 

Only  two  motives,  observes  Professor  Friedrich 
Miiller,  can  induce  the  Australian  or  the  typical 
African  to  prolonged  labour, — hunger  and  the  sex 
passion.  Civilised  communities  are  measurably  lifted 
above  the  immediate  struggle  for  food,  but  not  in 
the  least  above  the  other  impulse.  If  you  could 
learn  the  prime  motive,  says  Dr.  Van  Buren,  of  the 
presence  of  the  crowds  of  men  on  Broadway,  you 
would  find  ninety  per  cent,  of  them  are  there  through 
sex  feeling. 

The  sentiments  of  love,  of  marital  and  parental  af- 
fection, of  family  life,  control  mankind  more  com- 
pletely than  any  other  motives.  These  are  physical, 
personal  feelings,  and  to  that  extent  narrow  and  in 
conflict  with  many  w^iich  are  broader  and  more 
altruistic.  Few  persons  can  advance  beyond  them, 
and  the  collective  mind  is  obliged  by  the  laws  of  its 


SOMA  TIC  ENVIRONMENT  137 

own  existence  to  register  them  as  of  the  very  first 
importance. 

The  power  of  a  group  is,  other  things  being  equal, 
in  proportion  to  the  size  of  the  group,  and  its  in- 
crease in  numbers  is  in  geometrical  proportion  to  its 
fecundity,  provided  the  food-supply  remains  sufficient. 

These  are  two  closely  related  and  essential  factors 
to  advance,  and  have  been  so  felt  from  man's  earliest 
infancy.  The  complicated  systems  of  marriage  and 
relationship  in  vogue  among  the  Australian  and 
other  rude  tribes  arose  from  the  effort  to  adjust  the 
birth-rate  to  the  available  amount  of  food.  Many 
of  the  forms  of  marriaofe  arose  from  the  same  con- 
sideration.  In  polygamous  countries  most  men  are 
monogamous  because  they  cannot  keep  large  fami- 
lies. Legal  infanticide,  exposure  of  the  new-born, 
as  in  China,  is  another  effort  in  the  same  direction. 
.Where  such  measures  are  not  legalised  they  reappear 
in  other  o^uises.  Artificial  abortion  and  intentional 
limitation  of  families  are  frequent  in  France  and  the 
United  States.  They  are  outcrops  of  a  sentiment  of 
self-protection  which  has  been  familiar  to  the  species 
from  its  beo^inninor. 

Sex  feeling  belongs  distinctly  to  the  animal  and 
emotional  side  of  human  nature.  Where  it  is  the 
dominating  motive,  neither  individual  nor  group  can 
attain  the  highest  development.     This  is  noticeably 


138  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

the  case  in  the  African.  Coloured  children  in  our 
public  schools  are  equal  to  their  white  associates  up 
to  the  age  of  puberty.  But  that  change  is  more 
profound  in  the  African  than  in  the  European  con- 
stitution. After  it  has  occurred,  the  difference  in 
favour  of  the  white  children  becomes  very  apparent. 
Their  mental  world  is  not  so  invaded  by  thoughts 
of  sex,  and  they  are  more  inclined  to  study. 

In  a  less  degree,  as  I  have  before  remarked,  the 
same  contrast  exists  between  the  Teutonic  and  Latin 
peoples  of  Europe,  and  has  been  acknowledged  to 
have  resulted  in  decided  advantages  for  the  former. 

Virility — that  is,  the  reproductive  potency  in  the 
male — bears  no  relation  to  the  strength  of  the  erotic 
passion. 

In  some  the  passion  of  sexual  love  is  little  more 
than  an  appetite.  Satisfied,  it  is  indefinitely  quies- 
cent, not  entering  into  the  general  life  ;  or,  if  it  at 
times  fires  the  emotions,  they  are  easily  restrained  or 
banished  by  the  exercise  of  other  mental  powers. 
This  has  been  the  case  with  many  eminent  men  of 
notoriously  ardent  temperaments  but  never  subdued 
by  them  (Byron,  Goethe). 

It  is  also  an  ethnic  trait,  a  characteristic  of  the 
Teutonic  blood,  in  sharp  contrast  to  the  so-called 
Latin  peoples.  With  the  latter,  as  is  obvious  from 
the  literature,  the  erotic  feeling  is  an  endurinof  and 


SOMATIC  ENVIRONMENT  139 

overmastering  passion,  colouring  the  intelligence  and 
often  absorbing  into  itself  the  activities  of  the  life. 

As  virility  in  man,  so  fecundity  in  woman  has  no 
relation  to  sex  feeling  ;  or,  if  any,  in  a  reverse  degree. 

The  famous  calculations  of  Malthus,  which  cannot 
be  disproved,  and  which  have  been  confirmed  by  the 
latest  statistics,  show  that  this  fear  of  population 
transcending  the  food-supply  is  real  and  ever  present. 
Where  it  is  not  immediate,  as  in  modern  life,  it  is 
nevertheless  near  and  visible  in  the  division  of  the 
parental  property  among  a  large  family  of  children  ; 
in  the  increased  difficulties  of  properly  educating  such 
a  family  and  giving  each  a  proper  position  and  start 
in  life  ;  and  in  providing  for  such  as  are  feeble  or  in- 
competent. This  effort,  extended  throughout  a  com- 
munity, means  more  intense  competition,  a  more  bitter 
struggle  for  property,  a  more  constant  occupation  with 
sordid  details,  to  the  neglect  of  reflection,  study,  and 
abstract  thouo^ht. 

o 

Reproduction,  therefore,  to  its  utmost  limits,  would 
be  of  no  advantage  to  a  community,  but  decidedly 
deleterious.  Its  effect  on  the  collective  mind  would 
be  lowerinof,  as  it  would  centre  the  ireneral  attention 
on  material  aims  and  personal  interests. 

Nor  is  the  individual  who  would  direct  his  activities 
by  the  highest  motives  at  all  compelled  to  increase 
his  kind.     The  accessory  demands  upon  his  time  and 


I40  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

powers  which  such  an  action  usually  entails,  would 
probably  hinder  him  in  his  efforts.  Darwin  forcibly 
stated  this  in  his  Descent  of  Man.  He  imagines  a  man 
who,  not  compelled  by  any  deep  feeling,  yet  sacrifices 
his  life  for  the  good  of  others  through  the  love  of  glory. 
"His  example  would  excite  the  same  wish  for  glory 
in  other  men  and  would  strengthen  by  exercise  the 
noble  feeling  of  admiration.  He  might  thus  do  far 
more  good  to  his  tribe  than  by  begetting  offspring 
with  a  tendency  to  inherit  his  own  high  character." 

If  this  is  true  of  one  governed  by  a  motive  confess- 
edly not  the  highest,  how  much  more  true  of  him  or 
her  whose  soul  is  fired  with  a  devotion  to  the  truth  of 
science  or  to  the  welfare  of  the  race  ! 

F eminism, — The  physical  contrast  of  the  sexes 
belongs  to  all  mammals,  to  birds,  and  to  most  of  the 
animal  kingdom.  The  female  is  generally  smaller, 
lighter,  with  lines  more  graceful  and  delicate.  This 
is  true,  as  a  rule,  in  all  races  of  men  and  held  good  for 
the  earliest  tribes  whose  skeletons  have  been  pre- 
served. Yet  the  contrast  in  man  is  so  far  from  posi- 
tive that  the  anatomist  knows  no  criteria  to  establish 
the  sex  from  the  bones  except  the  mQre_obtuse.angle_ 
^^f  the  rami  of  the  pubes  in  the  female ;  and  even  this 
is  obliterated  in  some  branches  of  the  human  race, 
the  Indo-Chinese,  for  example,  where  the  rami  meet 
in  both  sexes  at  about  the  same  angle  (Herve). 


SOMA  TIC  ENVIRONMENT  1 4 1 

The  tendency  to  **  feminism"  is  not  unusual  in 
the  white  race  as  an  individual  peculiarity  ;  and  is 
especially  prominent  as  a  racial  trait  in  the  Asiatic  or 
Mongolian  branch_  of  our  species.  They  have  sparse 
beards,  little  hair  on  the  body  but  much  and  strong 
on  the  head,  and  the  features  of  the  sexes  are  similar. 
In  many  j'espects  they  display  feminine  traits  of 
character,  being  industrious,  sedentary,  and  peace- 
loving,  receptive  but  not  originative,  ruled  by 
emotion,  and  easily  brought  under  the  influence  of 
nervous  impressions. 

Women  have  much  less  variability  than  men  ;  they 
are  precocious,  and  their  growth  more  rapid,  bjiL-the 
arrest  of  development  arrives  with  them  sooner. 
They  remain  near  the  child  type  throughout  their 
lives. 

Mr.  Havelock  Ellis  has  aro^ued  that  for  this  reason 
they  are  nearer  THe  future  type  of  the  species,  and 
that  the  results  of  modern  civilisation  are  to  render 


men  more  feminine  m  occupations,  character,  appear- 
ance, and  anatomy. 

It  would  be  more  correct  to  say  that  as  civilisation 
advances  the  distinctions  betw^en~the  sexes  erected 
by  conditions  of  lower  culture  tend  to  disappear,  each 
sex  oraininor  much  from  the  other  without  forfeitini;{ 
that  which  is  peculiarly  itsojvn. 

The  masculine  woman  and  the  feminine  man  are 


142  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

erratic,  often  degenerate  types.  The  tendency  to 
''lionio-scxuality "  (or  to  "  non-sexuality ")  has  ap- 
peared from  time  to  tifne~as  an  ethnic  trait.  It  was 
notorious  in  ancient  Greece  and  mediaeval  Italy,  and 
in  both  cases  presaged  deterioration. 

The  Vital  Powers. — Health  is  one  trait ;  tenacity 
of  life  another.  Feeble  and  sickly  people  some- 
times reveal  a  surprising  vitality ;  others,  who  are 
hale  and  athletic,  succumb  to  slight  attacks.  The 
American  Indian,  when  he  falls  ill,  gives  up  and  dies ; 
while  Europeans,  though  increasingly  requiring 
medical  attention,  are  growing  in  longevity. 

This  physical  fact  has  a  noticeable  bearing  on 
ethnic  psychology.  Where  the  old  survive,  the  pro- 
perty and  the  management  of  society  usually  rest 
in  their  hands.  The  traits  of  age  are  reflected  on 
the  collective  mind.  It  is  cautious,  perhaps  to 
timidity,  slow  in  action,  avoiding  strife.  These  are 
the  traits  of  Chinese  diplomacy,  in  which  country 
not  only  is  longevity  considerable,  but  the  respect 
for  the  old  passes  into  veneration. 
/  As  a  rule,  the  lower  forms  of  culture  are  associated 
^th  the  shortest  lives.  The  Australian  is  a  Nestor 
who  reaches  fifty  years.  Earlymaturity  and  early 
decay  mark  inferior  and  degenerate  stages  of  society. 
Hence  they  are  guided  by  in(£X2erienced  minds  and 
by  the  emotional  characters  of  youth. 


,  SOMA  TIC  ENVIRONMENT  143 

Temperament. — The  ancient  physicians  had  much 
to  say  about  "  temperaments,"  classifying  them  usually 
as  four,  the  sanguine,  bilious,  nervous,  and  phleg- 
matic. Both  modern  medicine  and  psychology  have 
rejected  these  as  a  basis  of  classification,  but  acknow- 
ledge that  there  lies  an  important  truth  in  the  ancient 
doctrine. 

Professor  Wundt,  for  example,  defines  tempera- 
ment from  the  psychological  standpoint  as  "  an  in- 
dividual tendency  to  the  rise  of  a  certain  mental 
state,"  and  Manouvrier,  recognising  the  intimate 
relationship  of  mind  and  body,  explains  it  as  "  an  en- 
semble of  physical  and  mental  traits  arising  from 
fundamental  constitutional  differences  "  in  individuals. 

Confining  myself  to  the  psychological  aspect  of 
temperament,  I  should  call  it  the  personal  mode  of 
reaction  to  different  classes  of  stimuli.  It  is  the  gen- 
eral disposition  of  the  mind,  the  individual  way  of 
looking  at  things,  r humeur  habiluelle,  and  is  independ- 
ent of  sentiments,  ideas,  or  knowledge.  It  is  the 
psychic  resultant  of  the  whole  organic  life  of  the  in- 
dividuals. In  this  sense,  the  distinctions  of  tempera- 
ments are  justified,  as  they  depend  on  the  dominance 
of  one  or  the  other  of  the  physiological  systems — cir- 
culatory, alimentary,  nervous,  genital,  etc. — in  the 
economy. 

Various  writers  (Manouvrier,   Ribot,   Kant)   have 


144  E  THNIC  PS  YCHOLOG  V 

adopted  as  the  measure  of  temperaments  and  the 
principle  of  their  classification,  the  one  standard  of 
energy ;  in  other  words,  molecular  change.  They 
speak  of  sthenic  and  hypersthenic  temperaments,  ac- 
tive and  passive,  etc. 

I  doubt  if  this  is  correct  In  physiology,  and  it  is 
certainly  not  so  in  psychology.  Men  of  all  tempera- 
ments may  be  equally  energetic,  equally  active  in 
life-work.  That  is  an  old  observation.  The  measure 
or  standard  should  be,  not  energy,  but  that  general 
mental  condition  called  happiness.  That  is  the  popu- 
lar distinction,  and  it  is  the  true  one.  When  we  speak 
of  a  sanguine,  bilious,  cheerful,  gloomy,  temperament, 
we  refer  to  a  s^eneral  and  characteristic  mental  atti- 
tude,  with  reference  to  individual  happiness. 

Rabelais  could  joke  on  his  death-bed,  but  Byron, 
young,  rich,  and  courted,  could  find  no  theme  for 
song  but  sorrow. 

The  phlegmatic  temperament  is  supposed  not  to 
enjoy  keenly,  but  also  not  to  suffer  keenly.  The  san- 
guine temperament  is  not  easily  cast  down  by  advers- 
ity, while  the  bilious  or  melancholic  person  is  little 
capable  of  appreciating  the  joyous  side  of  life. 

These  ancient  terms  may  not  be  acceptable  to  mod- 
ern science  ;  but  the  truths  on  which  they  are  based 
are  acknowledged  by  all  authorities. 

They  interest  us  here,  because  a  group  has  its  tem- 


SOMA  TIC  ENVIRONMENT  145 

perament  as  much  as  an  Individual,  drawn,  no  doubt, 
from  that  prevaiHng  among  its  members,  but  notice- 
ably strengthened  by  the  inherent  forces  of  ethnic 
psychics. 

The  recognition  of  this  is  seen  In  common  parlance 
when  we  speak  of  the  phlegmatic  Dutchman,  the  gay 
Frenchman,  etc. 

Such  popular  characterisations  may  not  be  accurate, 
but  they  serve  to  show  that  the  fact  of  a  national 
temperament  has  unconsciously  made  itself  felt. 

It  does  not  seem  dependent  either  on  nutrition, 
geographic  position,  or  history  ;  and  it  is  hereditary 
and  constant.  Thus  the  Eskimos,  living  amid  eter- 
nal snows,  with  a  limited  diet  and  a  desperately  hard 
struggle  for  existence,  have  a  singularly  cheerful  dis- 
position, loving  to  talk,  laugh,  and  indulge  in  pleas- 
ant social  intercourse.  On  the  other  hand,  the 
Cakchiquels  of  Guatemala,  living  amid  the  most 
beautiful  and  fertile  tracts  in  the  world,  are  chronic- 
ally morose  and  gloomy.  Their  temperament  Is  re- 
flected in  their  language,  which,  as  the  late  Dr. 
Berendt  remarked,  is  as  singularly  rich  in  terms  for 
sad  emotions  as  it  is  poor  for  those  of  a  joyous 
character. 

t  There  Is  no  doubt  that  a  cheerful  mental  disposi- 
tion is  In  itself  a  defence  aorainst  the  attacks  of  dis- 
>eeland,   in  his  anthropologic  studies  of  the 


T46  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

question,  found  that  persons  of  a  cheerful  tempera- 
ment are,  in  an  extended  series,  physically  stronger 
than  those  who  are  melancholic,  in  the  proportion  of 
148  :  135  ;  though  whether  this  should  be  regarded  as 
cause  or  consequence  is  open  to  construction  ;  and, 
while  fully  recognising  the  actuality  of  national  tem- 
peraments, he  adds  that  an  analysis  of  them,  with  a 
view  to  defining  their  causes,  is  still  far  from  practi- 
cable7  The  important  conclusion  which  he  reaches, 
however,  is  that  the  happier  temperament  corresponds 
to  the  higher  degree  of  health,  and  that,  in  compari- 
son,  that  which  tends  to  the  melancholic  is  morbid,  a 


pathologic  product,  an  indication  of  degeneration. 

Regarded  as  a  national  question,  we  derive  from 
this  that  the  calm  and  the  cheerful  temperaments  are 
those  which  promise  most  success  and  permanence. 


CHAPTER   II 

ETHNIC  MENTAL  DIVERSITY  FROM  COGNA  TIC 

CA  USES 

IN  the  last  chapter  I  have  considered  the  individual 
in  his  relation  to  the  group  simply  as  an  isolated 
unit,  with  his  own  powers  and  weaknesses. 

Both  of  these,  however,  he  derives  largely  from  his 
ancestors,  through  the  fact  that  he  is  born  a  member 
of  a  particular  species,  race,  and  family.  Such  traits 
react  powerfully  on  his  mental  life,  and,  indeed,  in 
themselves  force  him  into  relation  with  a  human 
group,  his  cognatic  or  kindred  associates. 

The  ethnic  psychologist  must  therefore  devote  to 
them  insistent  attention.  i—^For  convenience  of  study 
the  facts  may  be  grouped  under  three  headings, 
Heredity,  Hybrldity,  and  Racial  Pathology. 

Heredity. — In  body  and  mind,  the  child  resembles 
his  parents,  the  individual  his  ancestors.  This  Is  the 
principle  of  fixity  of  type,  the  permanence  of  species. 

Neither  In  body  or  mind  Is  the  child  ever  exactly 

147 


148  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

like  his  parents  or  either  one  of  them.  Differences 
are  always  visible.  This  is  the  principle  of  constant 
variation,  at  the  basis  of  the  unending  transforma- 
tions of  orofanic  forms. 

/  On  these  two  principles  rests  the  law  of  Evolution, 
which  may  be  progressive  or  regressive,  that  is, 
toward  greater  complexity  and  specialisation  or  to- 
ward  simplicity  and  homogeneity.  Of  these  two 
principles,  one  is  real,  the  other  merely  apparent, — the 
negative  or  minus  quantity  of  the  other,  as  cold  is  to 
heat  or  darkness  to  lieht.     Which  is  the  real  ? 

The  question  is  not  idle,  for  upon  its  correct  de- 
cision depends  the  accuracy  of  our  views  of  or- 
ganic life. 

)  So  long  as  the  doctrine  of  the  immutability  of 
species  was  accepted,  everyone  believed  in  the  fixity 
of  fype  as  the  prime  law.  When  Lamarck  and  Dar- 
win had  undermined  that  position,  and  up  to  a  very 
recent  date,  the  two  principles  were  considered  some- 
how equal,  dual  conflicting  forces,  the  fixity  of 
type  being  a  passive  result  of  the  action  of  the 
*' envIronment."v 

The  unphilosophical  character  of  such  a  concep- 
tion of  facts  has  now  become  apparent,  at  least  to  a 
few.  The  true  positive  of  the  two  forces  is  change, 
variation.  This  Is  the  one,  fundamental,  essential 
characteristic  of  living  matter.     Every  element  of  an 


DIVERSITY  FROM  COG N A  TIC  CAUSES        149 

organism  that  is  not  ceaselessly  changing  ceases  to 
be  living,  vital. 

"  Hereditary,"  therefore,  is  a  merely  negative  ex- 
pression. It  means  a  diminution,  not  a  cessation  of 
chanee.  Inherited  traits  are  those  in  which  the  rate 
of  variability  has  been  so  reduced  that  they  reappear 
by  repetition  in  several  or  many  generations.  Every 
one  of  them  began  in  some  single  individual,  was  due 
to  a  definite  exciting  cause,  and  was  transmitted  by 
the  route  of  reproduction.  Hence  inherited  traits 
have  been  properly  termed  "  secondary  variations." 

The  long  discussion  whether  acquired  characters 
can  be  inherited  has  virtually  been  decided  in  favour 
of  the  opinion  that  every  character,  whether  racial  or 
specific,  was  originally  acquired  by  a  single  person 
or  persons  and  transmitted  by  them.  The  data  of 
pathology  admit  of  no  doubt  on  this  point,  and  path- 
ology is  but  one  of  the  aspects  of  general  organic 
development. 

That  not  every  acquired  character  can  be  trans- 
mitted goes  without  saying  *;  and  it  is  equally  true 
that  hereditary  traits  vary  widely  in  their  capacity  for 
survival.  So  evident  is  this  that  they  have  been 
classified  by  observers  into  "strong"  and  "weak" 
traits,  the  latter  betraying  a  feebleness  of  self-per- 
petuation compared  to  the  former. 

I  have  been  discoursing  of  physical  heredity  and 


I50  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

some  of  its  observed  laws.  This  has  not  been  beside 
the  mark  ;  for  I  repeat  that  the  correlation  between 
body  and  mind  is  absolute.  Psychical  traits  are 
passed  down  from  generation  to  generation  hand  in 
hand  with  physical  peculiarities.  Men  are  what  they 
are  in  good  measure  because  they  are  born  so.  About 
this  the  students  of  heredity  are  unanimous  and  posit- 
ive. Hence  the  necessity  in  ethnic  psychology  of 
learning  the  laws  of  physical  heredity  and  applying 
them  to  the  history  of  the  mind. 

An  example  will  illustrate  this. 

There  is  a  curious  manifestation  of  transmission 
called  "  homochronous "  heredity.  The  adjective 
signifies  that  a  trait  which  appears  first  at  a  certain 
age  in  the  parent  will  also  appear  first  at  about  the 
same  age  in  the  offspring.  A  familiar  physiological 
example  is  the  date  of  the  beginning  and  the  end  of 
the  reproductive  period  in  women.  Inherited  tend- 
encies to  disease  will  recur  in  the  offspring  at  the 
age  they  revealed  themselves  in  the  parent.  This  is 
strikingly  true  of  mental  traits,  especially  those  which 
are  deorenerative. 

Even  in  the  mixed  populations  of  modern  states,  the 
connection  of  mental  with  physical  heredity  is  mani- 
fest. Commenting  on  the  population  of  France,  Dr. 
Collignon  observes  :  *'  To  the  difference  of  races,  a 
purely  anatomical  fact  attested  by  the  form  of  the 


DIVERSITY  FROM  COGNATIC  CAUSES        151 

skull,  the  colour  of  the  eyes  and  hair,  and  similar 
bodily  traits,  there  corresponds  a  cerebral  difference, 
which  shows  itself  in  the  prevailing  direction  of  the 
thoughts,  and  in  special  aptitudes."  These  contrasts 
are  shown  by  the  statistics  of  Jacoby,  who  examined 
the  birth  and  lineage  of  the  most  eminent  men  of 
France  in  all  departments  of  activity.  He  found  that 
the  Normans  were  decidedly  ahead  in  the  exact  sci- 
ences and  practical  affairs,  while  in  poetry,  romance, 
and  works  of  imagination  in  general  the  people  of  the 
Midi  were  far  superior  to  them. 

/ Heredity  is  believed  to  present  itself  in  another 

aspect,  which  has  excited  much  attention.  I  refer  to 
that  form  of  it  called  "  atavism  "  or  "  ancestral  rever- 
<;ix>n  "  c>x^'  retrogression,"  in  which  a  child  "  takes 
after,"  jiQt  his  immediate  parents^  but  some  remote 
ancestor ;  even,  as  has  been  often  claimed,  so  remote 
as  beyond_the  limits  of  nnr  oxyn  qperipq  Such  traits 
have  been  called   *'  pithecoid  "  (ape-like)   reversions, 


as  they  are  alleged  to  be  derived  from  some  four- 

footedprecursor  of  man,  an  ap^e,   or  even  a  lemur. 

Evolutionists  whose  enthusiasm  transcended  their 


discretion  have  pointed  out  many  such  features  in  the 
human^skeleton.  A  few  years  ago  (1894)  I  gathered 
these  together,  and  in  a  paper  read  before  the  Ameri- 
can Association  for  the  Advancement  of  Science,  I 
undertook    to    prove    that    these    features    can    be 


152  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

satisfactorily  explained  by  mechanical  and  functional 
processes  acting  in  the  individual  life  or  in  that  of  his 
immediate  ancestors,  and  that  we  have  no  occasion  to 
appeal  to  hypotheses  of  descent,  which  have,  at  least, 
never  been  proved.  Other  American  anatomists 
(Bowditch,  Baker)  endorsed  and  supported  by  further 
evidence  this  position,  so  that  physical  anthropologists, 
in  our  country  at  least,  have  said  less  about  atavism 
than  formerly  ;  and  the  final  blow  to  it  has  been  dealt 
quite  lately  by  a  Dutch  writer.  Dr.  Kohlbriigge. 
He  has  established  the  thesis  that  "  all  so-called  ata- 


vistic anomalies  are  meaningless  for  the  race-type. 
They  are  brought  about  by  arrestsj)f  development  or 
general  variability.  They  depend  on  disturbances  of 
nutrition,  leading  to  excess  or  deficiency  of  productive 


energy,    presenting  a   deceptive    appearance   of  pro- 
gressive or  retrogressive  evolution." 


The  consideration  of  these  questions  in  physical 
heredity  is  necessaTy-in  psychology,  whether  indi- 
vidual •or  ethnic,  TiuL^merely  because  the  laws  of 
physical  run  parallel  to  tliose  of  psychical  life,  but  as 
well  for  "the  valuation  of  those  expressions  about 
'*  men  recurring  to  their  brute  ancestors  "  in  habits  or 
feelings,  sqJVequent  in  popular  literature. 

Hybridity. — The  intermixture  ofTiuman  races  or 
stocks,  human  hybridity  as  it  is  sometimes  called,  has 
been  recognised  by  all  anthropologists  to  be  a  prime 


DIVERSITY  FROM  CO GN A  TIC  CAUSES        153 

factor  in  ethnic  psychology,  in  the  psychical  history 
orMan. 

But,  strange  to  say,  the  opinions  about  its  results 
coiild  not  have  been  more  divergent.  On  the  one 
hand  we  have  a  corps  of  authors,  Gobineau,  Nott, 
Broca,  Hovelacque  Herve,  etc.,  who  condemn  the 
admixture  of  human  races  as  leading  inevitably  to 
mental  and  physical  degeneration,  infertility,  and 
extinction. 

In  direct  contradiction  to  them  we  find  the  not 
less  distinoruished  names  of  Ouatrefaores  and  Bastian, 

^^^ 

who  maintain  not  only  that  such  "  miscegenation  "  is 
harmless,  but  that  it  has  been  the  main  factor  of 
human  intellectual  progress  !  That  owing  chiefly  to 
it  certain  tribes  and  nations  have  by  unconscious 
selection  drawn  to  themselves  the  strong  qualities  of 
many  Imes  of  blood,  and  thus  won  the  foremost  place 
in  the  struggle  for  existence.  This  was  notably  the 
opmion  of  Ouatrefages,  who  defended  the  thesis, 
''In  race-rnmcrling  the  crossing  is  unilateral  and  is 
directed  under  unconscious  selection  toward  the  su- 
perior race." 


This  is  supported  by  many  well-known  examples. 
In  our  own  country,  the  superiority  of  the  mulatto  to 
the  fulftlood  negro  is  proved  by  history  and  is  fa- 
miliar to  alTobservers  ;  and  Dr.  Boas  has  shown  by 
statistical   researches   that    the  half-blood    Indian    is 


154  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

mentally  superior  to  his  companion  of  pure  lineage, 
while  the  half-blood  Indian  women,  instead  of  reveal- 
ing diminished  fertility,  average  two  more  children  to  a 
marriage  than  their  red  sisters  of  unmixed  lineage. 
;  But  it  will  not  do  to  ignore  the  array  of  facts  of 
contrary  tenor  which  has  been  marshalled  to  show 
that  in  divers  instances  the  result  of  race-mixture  has 
been  disastrous. 

Many  of  these  may  easily  be  explained  by  the  un- 
fortunate social  condition  of  children  in  such  unions, 
mostly  illegitimate,  or  at  odds  with  extreme  poverty 
and  its  ill  surroundings.  If  they  do  inherit  an  increased 
ability,  i-t  is,  under  modern  conditions,  more  apt  to  be 
directed  against  than  in  favour  of  the  social  order. 

After  all  such  allowances,  there  remains  a  residue 
unexplained  by  them,  and  inconsistent  with  the  gen- 
eral theory  of  advantage  in  race-intermixture. 

The  solution  of  this  problem  is  to  be  found  in  the 
operation  of  an  obscure  but  certain  law  of  heredity 
which  has  been  demonstrated  by  the  best  modern 
observers. 

This  reads  that  in  the  struggle  for  transmission 
between  contrary  characteristics  in  the  parents,  any 
trait,  mental  or  physical,  may  be  passed  down  separ- 
ately, indep evidently  of  others. 

Thus,  on  the  physical  side,  the  father  may  have 
red,  the   mother  black,   hair.     The   children  will  in- 


DIVERSITY  FROM  CO GN A  TIC  CA  USES        155 

herit,  not  a  blended  colour,  but  some  the  red,  some 
the  black  hair.  Or,  let  us  say,  one  parent  has  marked 
musical  ability,  the  other  none.  Some  of  the  children 
will  have  as  much  as  the  gifted  parent,  the  others  be 
devoid  of  the  faculty. 

It  is  essentiali_also,  to  remember  that  it  is  the  in- 
ferior race  only  which  reaps  the  psychical  advantage. 
Compared  to  the^£arent  of  the  higher  race,  the  child- 
ren are  a  deteriorated  product.  Only  when  con- 
trasted with  the  average  of  the  lower  race  can  they  be 
expected  to  take  some  precedence.  The  mixture,  if 
general  and  continued  through  generations,  will  in- 
fallibly entail  a  lower  grade  of  power  in  the  descend- 
ant. The  net  balance  of  the  two  accounts  will  show 
a  loss  when  compared  with  the  result  of  unions  among 
the  higher  XTKc.e  nlone. 

This  consideration  has  led  a  recent  writer.  Dr. 
Reibmayr,  to  a  theory  of  ethnic  mental  development 
which  merits  close  attention. 

A  family,  tribe,  caste,  or  race,  to  preserve  and 
increase  its  faculties  must  sedulously  avoid  intermar- 
riao^e  with  one  of  inferior  crifts.  The  value  of  "  breed- 
incr  in-and-in "  is  familiar  to  all  interested  in  the 
improvement  of  the  lower  animals.  This  was  at- 
tained in  primitive  life  by  the  tribal  law  of  endogam- 
ous  marriages,  by  which  a  man  must  take  his  wife 
within  the  tribe,  but  not  of  his  immediate  blood. 


156  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

The  superiority  which  this  developed  led  to  the 
subject  ion  of  other  tribes,  and  this,  through  capture 
and  en^vement  of  the  women,  to  intermixture  of 
blood,  with  its  above  mentioned  first  consequences  : 
deterioration  of  power  in  the  captors,  and,  next,  ele- 
vation of  the  lower,  conquered  tribe. 

The  former  was  sometimes  counteracted  by  the 
maintenance  of  purity  of  blood  in  a  portion  of  the 
community,  which  thus  became  the  ruling  class  ;  and 
if  this  did  not  take  place,  the  tribe  itself  soon  fell 
beneath  the  sway  of  some  neighbour  which  had  main- 
tained its  lineage  more  purely. 

Thus,  says  Dr.  Reibmayr,  the  history  of  human 
mental  development  is,  in  fact,  the  history  of  human 
hybridlty  and  its  necessary  consequences. 

Thus  it  appears  that  the  reciprocal  action  of  these 
two  genetic  processes,  the  one  of  close  and  closer 
mterbreeding,  the  other  of  wide  and  w^ider  intermix- 
ture of  blood,  is  the  prime  element  in  modifying  the 
psychical  faculties, — in  other  words,  in  creating  and 
moulding  the  ethnic  mind. 


How  weighty  this  consideration  becomes  when  we 
reflect  that  throughout  historic  times,  that  is,  from 
the  earliest  dawn  of  civilisation,  the  subspecies  of 
man  have  ever  been  as  clearly  contrasted  in  every 
feature  as  they  are  to-day  !  The  oldest  monuments 
of  Egypt  and  Assyria  show  their  portraits  as  typical 


DIVERSITY  FROM  COGNATIC  CAUSES        157 

as  If  carved  or  painted  yesterday.  No  boreal  fount- 
ain can  wash  the  Ethiopian  white  ;  no  kisses  of 
tropical  Phoebus  could  turn  Cleopatra  black. 

We  are  constrained  to  adopt,  therefore,  the  princi- 
ple formulated  by  Orgeas,  that,  so  far  as  history 
knows,  "  the  races  of  men  have  never  altered  their 
traits  except  through  intermarriage." 

The  physical  criteria  of  race,  such  as  the  colour  of 
the  skin,  the  hair,  the  shape  of  the  skull,  the  odour  of 
the  glands,  are  well  marked  in  the  gross.  I  have 
examined  their  relative  values  for  purposes  of  classi- 
fication in  another  work,  and  need  not  repeat  the 
details  here.  But  the  question  is  pertinent :  Are 
there  psychological  distinctions  separating  the  sub- 
species of  man  as  clearly  as  those  of  his  physical 
economy  ? 

Conflictinor  answers  have  been  and  still  are  offered 
to  this  inquiry.  By  some  the  mental  powers  of  the 
races  are  asserted  to  be  as  sharply  contrasted  as  their 
personal  appearance,  and  the  gulf  between  them  to 
be  practically  impassable. 

I  have  already  said  that  nothing  in  the  minute  or 
gross  anatomy  of  the  brain  can  be  offered  to  support 
this  view.  The  contributions  to  the  general  culture 
of  the  species  have  been  markedly  unequal  ;  but  may 
not  this  be  explained  by  other  reasons  than  inherent 
physical  inequalities? 


T58  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

I  have  already  expressed  the  opinion  that  human 
groups  have  differed  less  in  inherent  psychical  cap- 
acity than  in  stimuli  and  opportunities.  Such,  also,  is 
the  belief  of  that  profound  student  of  human  develop- 
ment, Professor  Bastian.  He  claims  that  convincinor 
evidence  in  favour  of  such  a  view  can  be  drawn  from 
the  uniformity  in  the  development  of  thoughts,  inven- 
tions, customs,  religions,  and  the  other  elements  of 
culture  the  world  over,  up  to  a  certain  point  at  which 
other  intercurrent  influences  entered,  not  dependent 
on  race  distinctions. 

After  a  prolonged  study  of  primitive  peoples  the 
anthropologist  Waitz  reached  the  conclusion  that 
there  is  not  and  never  was  any  positive  difference  in 
the  intellectual  power  of  races  ;  and  the  historian 
Buckle,  reviewing  the  record  of  the  species  in  time, 
announced  his  conviction  that  "  the  natural  faculties 
of  man  have  made  no  progress." 

In  abundant  instances  the  children  of  savage  parents 
have  been  brought  up  in  civilised  surroundings  and 
have  shown  themselves  equal  and  occasionally  superior 
to  their  comrades  of  the  so-called  higher  race  in  all 
the  tastes  of  cultured  society.  It  were  useless,  there- 
fore, to  talk  of  an  average  natural  inferiority. 

The  attainment  of  a  possible  average,  therefore, 
must  be  conceded.  But  this  must  not  be  construed 
as  closing  the  question  historically  or  psychically. 


DIVERSITY  FROM  COGNA  TIC  CA  USES        159 

It  Is  constantly  observed  in  education  that  children 
of  equal  ability  are  by  no  means  equally  good  schol- 
ars. They  respond  differently  to  the  stimulus  of  the 
desire  of  knowledge. 

Such  contrasts  are  witnessed  in  races  also,  and, 
apart  from  whatever  other  influences  we  may  name, 
are  hereditary  characteristics,  recurring  indefinitely 
and  controlling  the  racial  mind,  its  activities  and  its 
ambitions. 

So  visible  are  the  mental  differences  of  races  that 
some  writers  have  advocated  a  psychological  class- 
ification in  anthropology.  Professor  Letourneau  has 
attempted  it  in  one  of  his  many  treatises. 

Pathology. — But  it  is  not  sufficient  in  this  study  of 
racial  psychology  to  recount  what  a  race  has  done 
and  left  undone  in  the  work  of  the  world.  We  must 
also  turn  a  gloomier  page  and  take  into  account  the 
pathological  mental  symptoms  it  betrays  ;  for  these 
may  be  indicative  of  a  disease  so  deep  seated  and  so 
fatal  that  the  doom  of  the  race  is  inevitable,  ^^en 
we  see  whole  peoples  dying  out,  not  through  external 
violence,  but  throuorh  some  Internal  lack  of  vital  force 
or  adaptability,  as  in  the  instances  of  the  Tasmanians, 
Australians,  Polynesians,  and  American  Indians,  we 
may  be  sure  that  either  In  mind  or  body  they  are  they 
victims  of  some  deep-seated,  fatal  disease. 

Most  writers,  treating  the  subject  superficially,  have 


i6o  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

sought  for  the  cause  of  the  decHne  and  destruction  of 
peoples  in  the  decay  of  their  institutions,  in  the  im- 
morahty  of  their  Hves,  in  their  apathy  to  danger,  or 
m  the  loss  of  their  ambitions.  These  are  but  syrn- 
ptoms  of  the  mental  or  physical  malady  which,  "  min- 
ing  all  within,  infects  unseen."  They  are  the  results 
of  the  incurable  ailment  which  is  hurrying  them  to 
destruction.  Dr.  Oreeas  is  rio^ht  in  his  contention 
that  "  the  pathological  characteristics  of  peoples  have 
played  leading  parts  in  the  grand  dramas  of  history, 
though  they  have  too  often  escaped  the  observation 
of  historians." 

It  finds  its  expressions  in  such  phenomena  as 
Ratzel  enumerates  as  the  cause  of  the  deaths  of 
peoples — restlessness,  indifference  to  life,  debauchery, 
infanticide,  murder,  cannibalism,  constant  war,  slavery, 
laziness.  When  these  are  carried  to  the  extent  of  redu- 
cing the  personal  and  numerical  vigour  of  a  tribe  or  race, 
it  indicates  that  its  intellect  is  awry,  its  mind  is  diseased. 

/  Thus  the  ineradicable  restlessness  of  the  red  race, 
which  more  than  any  other  one  trait  has  stood  in  the 
way__of  their  self-culture,  belongs  in  the  pathology  of 
their  nervous  system.  As  Dr.  Buschan  points  out, 
and  as  I  have  elsewhere  emphasised,  they  are  espe- 
cially  subject  to  ''  diseases  of  excitement,"  contagious 
nervous  disorders,  leading  to  scenes  of  the  wildest 

I  not  and  tribal  loss. 


DIVERSITY  FROM  COGNA  TIC  CA  USES        1 6 1 

They  share  this  pathological  condition  with  the 
Malayo-Polynesian  peoples  of  the  Pacific  island-world. 
Among  them  both  we  find  numerous  examples  of  that 
outbreak  of  homicidal  mania  called  '*  running  amuck" 
(properly  a7noIc),  where  the  maniac  rushes  into  a 
crowd,  killing  whom  he  can  ;  a  crowd,  not  of  enemies, 
as  in  the  "  Berserkerwuth  "  of  the  Northmen,  but  of 
friends  and  relatives.  The  abandoment  of  both  races 
to  alcoholism  and  narcotics  is  an  evidence  of  the  same 
morbid  nervous  excitability./  This  is  an  inherited 
racial  pathological  tendency  and  is  not  to  be  measured 
by  the  mere  prevalence  of  nervous  diseases.  These 
may  arise  from  the  increased  strain  on  the  neurons 
when  the  struggle  for  existence  is  intensified.  CXhe 
enfranchised  blacks  since  they  have  been  obliged  to 
support  themselves  present  a  much  larger  percentage 
of  brain  and  nerve  disease ;  such  maladies  amonor  the 
Jews  of  Europe  are  six  times  rnore  frequent  than 
amoncr  the  Aryans  ;  and  certain  forms,  such  as  pro- 
gressive paralysis,  are  unknown  in  any  but  the  most 
civilised  communities. 

The  immunity  of  races  to  disease,  or  its  reverse, 
reacts  powerfully  on  their  mental  life,  leading  in  the 
latter  case  to  discouragement  and  apathy,  in  the 
former  to  confidence  and  conquest. 

Two  of  the  most  striking  examples  are  measles  and 
smallpox.      In  the  white  race,  the  former  has  become 


i62  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

merely  one  of  the  "  diseases  of  children,"  exciting  lit- 
tle alarm,  and,  against  the  latter,  vaccination  provides 
an  efficient  protection.  Among  native  Polynesians 
and  Americans  the  ravages  of  both  have  been  so  dread- 
ful as  not  merely  to  decimate  a  population  but  to  leave 
the  survivors  mentally  prostrate  and  indifferent  to 
life.  To  such  an  extent  has  this  mental  depression 
sometimes  progressed  that  some  tribes,  as  the  Lenguas 
of  La  Plata,  have  decided  on  the  self-destruction  of 
their  race,  and  destroyed  all  their  children  at  birth. 

The  immunity  of  the  white  race  to  malignant 
measles  is  not  due  to  any  special  power  of  resistance, 
but  to  well-known  laws  of  natural  selection  in  disease, 
and  does  not  extend  to  many  diseases.  The  Japan- 
ese are  practically  immune  to  scarlet  fever,  the 
black  race  to  yellow  fever,  etc.,  and  that  all  such 
exemptions  react  favourably  on  the  ethnic  mind 
cannot  be  doubted.  Such  immunity  is  strictly  cog- 
natic,  a  legacy  of  blood  in  the  true  physiological 
sense,  the  human  cells  having  undergone  changes 
by  the  repeated  attacks  of  the  disease  germs  result- 
ing in  practical  indifference  to  their  assaults. 

Indirectly,  the  march  of  epidemics  has  often  not 
only  decided  the  fate  of  nations  but  worked  remarkable 
changes  in  national  character.  A  familiar  and  striking 
example  is  the  result  of  the  Black  Death  (bubonic 
typhus)  in  England  in  the  reign  of  Edward  III. 


CHAPTER  III 

THE  INFL  UENCE  OF  THE  SOCIAL  ENVIRONMENT 

A  T  the  risk  of  needless  repetition  I  again  empha- 
^^^  sise  the  fact  that  Ethnic  Psychology,  the  group- 
mind,  is  a  product  of  social  relations,  a  result  of 
aggregation,  and  cannot  be  fully  explained  by  the 
processes  of  the  individual  mind.  The  resemblances 
between  them  are  analogies,  not  homologies.  They 
act  and  react,  one  on  the  other,  with  the  force  of 
independent  psychic  entities. 

The  general  proposition  to  this  effect  I  have  laid 
down  in  the  second  chapter  of  Part  I.  Now  I  shall 
go  more  into  detail  and  examine  just  what  influences 
the  ethnic  mind  brings  to  bear  upon  that  of  the  indi- 
vidual to  bring  it  into  rapport  with  itself,  to  make  it 
conform  to  the  mass,  to  expunge,  in  fact,  all  that  is 
individual  within  it. 

I  have  also  briefly  but  sufficiently  referred  to  the 

psychologic  measures  by  which  this  is  accomplished, 

such    as    imitation,    opposition,    and    continuity,    by 

which  the  anti-social  instincts  are  curbed,  but  at  the 

163 


i64  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

same  time  originality  and  independence  are  also 
often  crushed. 

It  remains  to  point  out  the  exact  instruments 
which  the  group-mind  employs  in  this  process  and 
to  estimate  their  relative  force. 

These  may  be  classified  under  five  headings  :  Lan- 
guage, Law,  Religion,  Occupation,  and  Social  Rela- 
tions. This  is  in  the  order  of  the  influence  which 
they  generally  exert  on  the  individual  mind,  which 
influence  is  to  be  understood  as  reciprocal,  the  indi- 
vidual working  most  potently  on  the  ethnic  mind 
in  the  same  order  of  instruments.  It  is  true,  how- 
ever, that  the  relative  potency  of  each  of  them  varies 
considerably  with  the  condition  of  culture.  Let  us 
briefly  examine  their  several  characteristics. 

Language. — Of  all  bonds  which  unite  men,  none 
other  is  so  strong  as  language.  This,  indeed,  it  is 
which  first  developed  the  human  in  man.  I  have 
shown  that  the  one  distinguishing  trait  which  divides 
man  from  brute  is  his  power  of  general  conceptions 
under  symbols.  The  word  ''language"  provides  the 
symbol.  To  form  words  is  the  necessary  first  step 
in  reasoning  ;  to  attach  to  words  precise  meanings, 
perfect  connotations,  is  the  main  effort  of  all  sub- 
sequent reasonings.  Words  are  the  storehouse  of 
all  knowledge  ;  they  are  the  tools  of  the  mind,  by 
which  all  its  constructions  are  framed. 


SOCIAL  ENVIRONMENT  165 

Language  is  the  Involuntary  product  of  the  human 
Intellect.  The  man  speaks  with  like  spontaneity  as 
the  dog  barks  or  the  bird  sings  ;  but  the  brute's  in- 
articulate cry  expresses  mere  emotion,  while  the 
man's  articulate  sounds  convey  thought. 

Language  is  a  proof  of  man's  original  social  nature. 
It  Is  impossible  to  explain  it  as  other  than  the  action 
of  a  group.  It  is  due  directly  to  the  need  of  others 
felt  by  each.  The  individual  alone  could  never  form 
a  speech,  and  hence  he  could  never  clearly  think  ;  for 
thought,  for  clearness,  needs  not  only  creation  but 
expression.  We  never  fully  understand  or  fully  be- 
lieve, until  another  understands  us  and  believes  with 
us. 

Hence,  language^ js__the^  most  perfect  example  of 
ethnic  psychical  action.  It  is  the  product  of  the 
group,  to  which  each  individual  of  the  group  con- 
tributes his  share,  and  which  is  the  common  property 
of  all,  reflecting  at  once  the  traits  of  the  group  and 
the  relations  of  the  individual  to  it. 

Nor  Is  language  a  merely  temporary  criterion  of 
group-character.  Conspicuously  not.  Nothing  clings 
so  tenaciously  to  us  as  our  mother  tongue.  Religions 
may  fade  and  Institutions  decay,  we  may  change  our 
clime  and  culture,  but  the  tongue  persists.  It  is  passed 
from  generation  to  generation,  exceeding  count.  No 
heirloom  is  so  cherished,  no  tradition  so  hoary. 


1 66  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

By  the  Aryan  tongues  of  modern  Europe  anti- 
quaries have  restored  the  mode  of  Hfe  of  that 
primitive  horde  v^ho  spoke  the  ancestral  speech  of  all 
the  Indo-European  peoples,  now  stretching  in  an 
unbroken  line  from  Farther  India  to  San  Francisco. 
Unnoticed  but  indelible,  the  ethnic  life  of  that  horde 
left  its  impressions  on  its  speech  like  the  footsteps  on 
geologic  strata  from  which  the  palaeontologists  re- 
construct the  strange  forms  of  extinct  species. 

As  the  individual  can  convey  his  thoughts,  his  per- 
sonality to  the  group,  in  the  language  of  the  group, 
he  is  confined  and  limited  by  that  language.  Hence 
the  sovereign  necessity  in  this  investigation  to  study 
not  merely  the  contents  of  a  tongue,  its  verbal  rich- 
ness and  resources,  but  that  subtler  side  of  it,  its 
form  or  morphology.  Indeed,  the  highest  aim  of 
linguistic  science,  of  \\\^  philosophy  of  language,  is  to 
estimate  the  influences  of  the  various  forms  of  speech 
not  merely  on  the  expression,  but  on  the  formation 
of  ideas.  We  think  in  words  and  in  grammatical 
relations,  and  both  should  be  logical  and  accurate  if 
our  expressed  results  shall  be  so  also.  .  -v 

Few  but  specialists  are  aware  how  widely  the 
varieties  of  human  speech  differ  in  the  power  they 
exert  of  this  formative  character.  Suppose  that  in 
English  we  could  not  speak  of  that  ''  divine  tool,"  the 
hand,  except  as  a  bodily  member  belonging  to  some 


SOCIAL  ENVIRONMENT  167 

particular  person,  "  my  hand  "  or  ''John's  hand  "  ;  how- 
it  would  crush  all  means  of  generalisation,  shut  in 
our  minds  to  present  and  local  cases  !  Yet  this  is  the 
case  in  hundreds  of  American  and  some  Asiatic 
dialects,  not  only  with  this  but  many  classes  of  con- 
cepts. How  are  we  to  convey  the  simplest  arithmeti- 
cal relations  to  tribes  who  have  no  words  for  integers 
beyond  5  ?  What  is  more  hopeless,  how  can  a  member 
of  such  a  tribe  ever  become  an  arithmetician  of  his 
own  effort  ? 

Thus  an  individual  is  a  mental  slave  to  the  tonofue 
he  spealcs?    VirtuallyV'trtxes  the  limits  of  his  intel- 


lectual lifel  HTs  most  violent  efforts  cannot  tran- 
scend them.  Here  the  group,  the  ethnic,  mind 
exercises  tyrannical  sway  over  him. 

So  also  do  the  contents  of  his  tongue.  I  mean  by 
this  that  incalculable  potency  broadly  called  literature, 
spoken  or  written,  —  the  oratory,  romance,  poetry, 
philosophy,  history,  and  science, — which  is  his  daily 
mental  food  all  the  years  of  his  conscious  life.  In 
this  maelstrom  of  the  opinions  of  others,  his  own  in- 
dividuality is  generally  submerged  ;  he  loses  it  in  the 
struggle,  and  his  own  talk  becomes  but  the  echo  of 
that  of  others  of  the  group. 

Law. — Writers  who  imagine  that  Law  is  a  product 
of  Culture  are  singularly  off  the  track.  Nowhere  are 
its  prescriptions   more    definite,    its    violation    more 


i68  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

abhorred,  or  its  penalties  more  Inflexibly  enforced 
than  In  the  lowest  depths  of  savagery.  There  the  pun- 
ishment Is  known  and  leniency  unknown.  When  the 
Australian  black  has  broken  the  unwritten  law  of  his 
tribe,  he  has  but  two  alternatives, — disappearance 
forever  or  death.  After  accepting  the  latter,  or  when 
seized  In  his  flight,  he  quietly  digs  his  own  grave  and, 
sitting  In  it,  awaits  the  spears  of  his  tribesmen. 

So  the  "  totemic  "  bond,  the  earliest  form  of  per- 
manent grouping  in  many  families  of  mankind, 
whether  based  on  religious  or  consanguine  ties,  in- 
variably presents  a  compact  and  minute  system  of  re- 
strictions on  individual  liberty.  They  are,  Indeed, 
often  carried  to  such  an  extent  as  to  destroy  all  sense^^*-^ 
of  personal  responsibility  or  conscience,  and  to  limit 
independence  of  action  to  the  most  trivial  details  of 
life.  In  them,  through  the  recognised  power  of  law, 
the  group  is  everything,  the  individual  nothing. 
Hence,  they  preserve  but  do  not  progress  ;  for  I  can- 
not too  often  repeat  the  fundamental  distinction  be- 
tween the  group-mind  and  the  individual  mind  :  that 
the  former  is  active  and  preservative,  while  the  latter 
alone  Is  creative  and  progressive. 

By  the  general  term  ""  Law  "  I  mean  that  restraint 
exercised  by  the  group  on  the  Individual  which  in  Its 
last  recourse  Is  backed  by  physical  force.  It  makes 
no  difference  whether  the  sentiment  of  the  group  Is 


SOCIAL  ENVIRONMENT  169 

laid  down  by  the  High  Chancellor  in  his  ermine  or  by 
"Judge  Lynch  "  in  his  shirt-sleeves  ;  nor  whether  the 
group  is  the  House  of  Lords  or  a  gang  of  thieves,  the 
underlying  principle  —  that  of  the  forcible  constraint 
of  the  individual  by  the  community  —  remains  the 
same.  To  borrow  Blackstone's  definition,  it  is  the 
"  rule  of  conduct  "  which  the  group  chooses  to  estab- 
lish for  its  own  ends.  Law,  therefore,  is  essentially  a 
part  of  the  ethnic  mind,  not  conceivable  except  as  a 
group-product,  and  if  at  times,  apparently,  the  expres- 
sion of  one  mouth  (autocracy),  yet  voluntarily  ac- 
cepted by  the  group. 

The  body  of  concrete  laws  developed  in  a  commun- 
ity, whether  under  conditions  of  freedom  or  restraint, 
constitute  its  government.  Under  either  condition, 
the  government  is  rightly  regarded  as  the  most  sig- 
nificant product  of  the  ethnic  mind  as  revealing,  edu- 
cating, and  moulding  ethnic  or  national  character. 
For  any  permanently  accepted  government,  though  it 
may  have  been  instituted  by  force,  must  be  mainly  in 
unison  with  the  ethnic  traits. 

The  law  stretches  its  hand  over  all  the  activities  of 
the  individual,  mental  or  physical,  fostering  some  and 
repressing  others,  marking  the  limit  to  all.  Personal 
actions,  the  acquisition  of  property,  the  expression  of 
opinions,  all  are  by  common  consent  of  every  com- 
munity absolutely  subjected  to  the  ethnic  mind,  the 


lyo  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

will  of  the  group,  and  the  physical  power  of  the 
group  stands  ready  to  compel  obedience  to  this  will. 

Distinctly  the  ethnic  and  not  the  individual  will ; 
for  in  laws  we  have  frequent  examples  of  the  contrast 
between  the  two,  when  no  individual  approves  a  law 
which  all  approve.  There  is  not  an  American  writer 
who  would  be  willing  to  have  the  expression  of  his 
thoughts  gagged  by  government ;  and  not  one  but 
approves  of  the  law  of  libel. 

In  no  relation  of  human  life  has  the  influence  of 
law  as  a  moulder  of  ethnic  mental  unity  been  more 
observable  from  earliest  times  than  in  that  of  Mar- 
riage. 

It  is  my  own  opinion,  based  on  a  long  study  of  the 
subject,  that  physical  fidelity,  la  Jidelitd  du  corps^  as 
Manon  Lescaut  expressed  it,  of  either  sex  to  the  other 
never  was,  and  is  not  now,  what  is  termed  a  ''  natural " 
trait  of  human  character.  The  native  desire  for  sexual 
variety  is  equally  strong  in  both  sexes  and  has  been  so 
from  the  beo^inninof. 

Marriage  laws,  it  should  be  borne  in  mind,  have 
been  everywhere  and  in  all  time  framed  by  the  males 
alone,  and  they  all  reveal  the  intention  of  the  framers 
to  preserve  a  right  of  property  in  the  female,  to  limit 
her  sexual  freedom,  while  their  own  remains  unre- 
stricted. 

Collateral  interests,  such  as  the  extent  of  the  food- 


^ 


SOCIAL  ENVIRONMENT  171 

supply,  the  rules  of  transmission  of  property,  the  pur- 
ity of  castes  or  classes,  and  the  like,  have  frequently 
entered  into  the  bearing  of  marriage  laws  ;  but  the 
first  and  continued  aim  remains  the  prevention  of 
feminine  infidelity  and  the  retention  of  masculine 
independence. 

For  this  reason,  the  woman,  even  in  the  most  ad- 

/l^anced  states  to-day,  is  deprived  of  civic  rights  and 

Jf  kept  in  economic  dependence  ;  she  is  allowed  no  part 

0     gjin  either  the  making  or  the  execution  of  the  laws, 

)(y     and  her  position   is  ranked  with   that  of  minors  or 

adults  of  undeveloped  minds. 

Government,  therefore,  with  few  exceptions,  differs 
from  language  in  this,  that  it  is  the  exclusive  produc- 
tion of  the  male  ethnic  mind,  and  must  be  considered 
to  express  the  masculine  traits  only. 

The  form  of  marriage  intimately  affects  two  ques- 
tions of  prime  iii:iportance  in  ethnic  psychology  :  that 
of  purity  or  intermixture  of  blood,  and  that  of  the 
permanence  of  the  group. 

In  an  earlier  chapter  I  have  empnasised  the  re- 
sults of  close  and  of  mixed  breeding  in  man  as  one 
of  the  controlling  factors  of  his  advancement.  It  is 
obvious  that  the  forms  of  marriage  called  endogam- 
ous,  where  the  only  recognised  marriages  are  within 
the  clan  ;  monogamous,  where  there  is  but  one  wife  ; 
and    ''preferential"    polygamous,    where    there    are 


172  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

several  wives,  but  the  children  of  one  only  are  recog- 
nised as  legitimate,  greatly  favour  close  breeding. 

General  polygamous  marriages,  on  the  other  hand, 
lead  infallibly  to  intermixture  of  stocks  and  the  en- 
feeblement  of  the  higher  in  its  mental  capacity. 

Not  less  do  these  laws  affect  the  permanence  of  the 
group.  This  depends  directly  on  the  amount  of  pro- 
perty it  has,  and  its  ability  to  keep  it. 

In  any  form  of  communal  marriage  the  property 
descends  in  common  and  belongs  to  the  clan  or  con- 
sanguine group.  There  is  no  stimulus  to  the  indi- 
vidual to  augment  it,  as  he  gains  nothing  for  himself. 
Hence,  such  marriages  early  fell  into  disuse. 

General  polygamous  marriages  are  scarcely  less 
fatal.  Equal  rights  of  inheritance  between  the  off- 
spring of  several  mothers  lead  to  dissipation  of  the 
inheritance  and  to  family  feuds  in  the  division.  This 
is  conspicuously  true  of  inherited  dignities  and  power. 
In  history  no  polygamous  nation  has  long  survived 
the  internecine  feuds  between  the  many  heirs  to  the 
throne.  The  Sultan  is  safe  only  when  all  his  brothers 
are  murdered. 

The  marriage  laws  powerfully  influence  the  ethnic 
mind  in  another  direction,  heavily  fraught  with  weal 
or  woe  for  its  destiny ;  that  is,  in  the  respect  for 
woman  as  a  sex,  in  the  honour  shown  her,  in  the 
sentiment  of  chivalry. 


SOCIAL  ENVIRONMENT  173 

This  is  a  true  ethnic  sentiment,  quite  apart  from 
personal  affection  or  romantic  love.  It  reflects  the 
position  of  woman  in  the  group,  not  in  the  family, 
and  reflects  the  feelings  of  the  individual  mind 
toward  woman  as  a  sex,  as  a  part  of  the  general 
group. 

If  we  regard  culture  as  the  full  development  of 
the  sentiment  and  emotions,  as  well  as  the  intellect- 
ual faculties  of  a  community,  then  I  know  no  one 
criterion  which  will  measure  its  degfrees  more  accur- 
ately  than  the  prevailing  opinion  about  woman,  her 
place  and  her  dues. 

Where  the  laws  make  her  distinctly  dependent  and 
inferior,  where,  in  marriage,  she  becomes  more  or  less 
the  property  of  her  husband  or  the  mere  instrument 
of  his  passion,  it  is  impossible  that  the  general  sense 
of  the  community  can  regard  her  with  high  esteem. 
This  is  the  case  in  all  polygamous  nations. 

The  chivalry  of  the  Middle  Ages  was  the  direct 
consequence  of  the  inflexible  monogamy  commanded 
by  the  Church. 

Closely  related  to  these  influences  are  those  of 
celibacy  and  divorce  as  sanctioned  by  law. 

By  '*  Occupation  "  in  ethnology  is  meant  that  aim 
to  which  the  individual  devotes  most  of  his  time, 
thoughts,  and  energies. 

It  does  not  necessarily  mean  to  "work"  or  to  gain 


174  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

a  livelihood.  In  many  cases  it  is  mere  amusement 
or  a  routine  of  social  customs,  or,  like  the  beggar, 
sittincr  still  and  askinof  alms. 

Whatever  aim  it  acknowledges,  the  occupation  is 
one  of  the  most  direct  and  potent  agencies  in  the 
formation  of  character,  individual  and  national ;  In 
Shakespeare's  phrase,  "almost  the  nature  is  subdued 
to  what  it  works  In,  like  the  dyer's  hand." 

Some  ethnographers  have  selected  the  prevailing 
occupations  as  the  best  of  all  tests  to  distinguish  the 
grades  of  man's  cultural  advance.  They  have  divided 
his  progress  into  a  hunting,  a  pastoral,  an  agricult- 
ural, and  a  commercial  stage.  Much  may  be  said  in 
favour  of  such  a  division.  At  any  rate,  it  Indicates  the 
close  connection  between  human  life  in  the  aggregate 
and  individual  avocation. 

It  is  certain  that  the  man  or  the  group  who  have 
to  devote  their  whole  energies  to  obtain  the  necessi- 
ties of  existence  must  advance  very  slowly  or  not  at 
all  in  the  Intellectual  life.  This  partly  explains  the 
stationary  culture  of  the  Australian  black  and  the 
native  of  our  arid  western  plains. 

But  it  does  not  follow,  as  some  theorists  would 
have  us  believe,  that  leisure,  the  non-necessity  of 
work.  In  Itself  favours  progress.  The  reverse  Is  the 
case.  The  Polynesians,  for  whom  nature's  harvests 
were  ample,  were  as  low  as,  often  lower  than,  the  Aus- 


SOCIAL  ENVIRONMENT  175 

tralian.  Nothing  favours  progress  but  ordered  in- 
dustry directed  toward  a  distant  purpose. 

The  manner  in  which  occupations,  therefore,  modify 
the  ethnic  mind  varies  with  the  character  and  aims  of 
the  occupations.  The  first  distinction  may  be  drawn 
in  the  degree  in  which  they  favour  social  intercourse, 
and  thus  promote  the  unity  of  the  group.  In  this 
respect  agriculture  holds  a  low  place.  The  un- 
progressive  character  of  farming  communities  is  no- 
torious. The  contrast  of  the  adjectives  rustic  and 
urbane  shows  it  to  be  an  observation  of  ancient 
date.  The  cause  lies  chiefly  in  the  isolation  of  the 
farmer,  and  the  suspicion  and  jealousy  with  which  he 
usually  regards  his  nearest  neighbours. 

Another  cause  lies  deeper  and  is  of  general  value. 
Where  there  is  but  one  prevailing  occupation,  where 
all  men's  thoughts  and  energies  are  directed  along  the 
same  lines  to  the  same  ends,  there  can  be  little  social 
advance.  For  the  best  results  to  the  group  the 
movements  of  individual  activities  should  be  in  Inter- 
secting, not  in  parallel  lines.  This  is  the  main  secret 
of  the  superiority  of  city  life.  In  spite  of  its  many 
drawbacks. 

The  respect,  or  lack  of  it,  with  which  a  community 
regards  occupations  is  a  marked  trait  of  ethnic  psy- 
chology, and  reacts  powerfully  on  the  position  and 
destiny  of  the  nation. 


176  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

In  England,  commerce,  "trade,"  is  widely  regarded 
as  somewhat  degrading.  Yet  were  she  to  lose  her 
trade  she  would  promptly  sink  to  a  fourth-class  power 
— an  illustration  of  what  I  have  before  remarked,  that 
a  sentiment  of  the  group-mind  may  not  be  that  of  the 
individuals  of  the  group. 

The  vocation  of  arms  is  reg^arded  in  modern 
Europe  with  admiration,  but  in  China  with  dis- 
respect ;  the  results  of  which  have  proved  that  the 
Chinese,  if  correct,  are  far  ahead  of  their  time. 

The  veneration  of  the  priestly  office  has  coloured 
the  thoughts  and  written  the  fate  of  many  a  nation  ; 
and  there  is  no  lack  of  examples  to-day  where  their 
oracles  close  the  ethnic  mind  to  the  admission  of 
verifiable  knowledofe  and  the  results  of  science. 

The  disrespect  for  occupations  beneficial  to  the 
group  is  an  invariable  proof  of  low  intelligence  in  the 
ethnic  mind.  The  result  of  such  a  sentiment  Is  anti- 
social and  weakens  the  power  of  the  group  as  a  unit, 
by  promoting  divisions  and  opposition  among  its 
members. 

The  extreme  of  this  is  seen  In  the  system  of  castes, 
rigidly  carried  out,  as  in  India,  and  resulting  every- 
where in  national  impotence  and  ethnic  dissociation. 
The  former  system  of  feudal  aristocracy  in  Europe 
was  little  better,  and  led  to  civil  wars,  the  fruits  of 
national  disunity. 


SOCIAL  ENVIRONMENT  177 

National  unity,  to  be  of  the  highest  type,  must  be 
based  on  equal  respect  for  every  man's  employment, 
if  that  employment  is  of  advantage  to  the  com- 
munity. 

By  confining  the  exercise  of  certain  highly  honoured 
occupations  to  so-called  "privileged"  classes,  a  heavy 
blow  is  dealt  at  the  unity  of  the  ethnic  mind.  Class 
jealousy  and  party  antagonism  are  developed,  followed 
by  a  corresponding  weakening  of  the  national  force. 
Modern  democracy  fully  recognises  this  danger,  but 
has  been  unable  to  remove  it  under  the  ofuise  of 
nepotism  and  succession  in  office. 

It  need  hardly  be  added  that  where  there  exists  a 
recognised  distinction  between  owners  and  slaves,  or 
between  a  ''ruling"  and  a  ''subject"  class,  unity  of 
group  sentiment  or  thought  is  out  of  the  question. 

Yet,  in  modern  life  strenuous  exertions  are  fre- 
quent to  insist  on  a  distinction  of  the  occupations  of 
men  and  women,  based,  not  on  capacity  or  oppor- 
tunity, but  on  the  fact  of  sex  alone,  the  general 
effort  beinor  to  confine  women  to  "menial"  or  me- 
chanical  occupations  only. 

The  philosophical  ethnologist  can  see  in  this 
nothing  but  the  near-sighted  effort  of  the  strong 
to  oppress  the  weak,  unaware  of  its  sure  recoil  on 
themselves.  In  reducing  the  influence  of  woman, 
exerted     through     beneficial     activities,     the    ctluios 


178  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

directly  diminishes  the  elements  of  its  own  advance- 
ment. Goethe  never  wrote  a  deeper  truth  than  in  his 
famous  lines  : 

Das  ewig  weibliche, 
Zieht  iins  hinan. 

And  the  ethnic  psychologist  has  no  sounder  maxim 
than  that  uttered  by  Steinthal  :  "  The  position  of 
woman  is  the  cardinal  point  of  all  social  relations." 

The  ethnic  psychologist  has  a  wide  field  in  the 
study  of  the  influence  of  particular  occupations  on 
the  minds  of  those  engaged  in  them,  and  thereafter 
on  the  mind  of  the  group.  He  will  have  to  examine 
the  assertion  that  some,  though  necessary,  are  in 
themselves  deterioratingf  to  the  better  elements  of 
humanity.  Cd:il  the  slaughter  of  men  in  war  be  carried 
on  without  brutalising  the  sentiments  ?  Can  com- 
merce be  successfully  conducted  without  deception  ? 
Can  the  advocate  do  his  best  for  the  guilty  client 
without  impairing  his  sentiment  of  truthfulness  ? 

Further  subjects  of  study  must  be  the  influence  of 
occupations  on  home  and  family  Hfe.  Many  involve 
travel,  enforced  absences,  or  a  migratory  career, 
weakening  such  ties. 

A  marked  tendency  of  modern  occupations  is 
toward  increased  specialisation.  A  man  will  spend 
his  life,  it  has  been  said,  in  making  the  ninth  part 
of  a  pin  ;    and   it    has    been  asked,  with  accents   of 


SOCIAL  EN VIRONMENT  1 7 9 

despair,  what  hope  for  the  mental  growth  of  such  a 
case  ?  Yet,  in  fact,  the  lawyer  confined  to  his  local 
code,  or  the  medical  specialist  to  the  diseases  of  one 
organ,  has  the  horizon  of  his  daily  labour  as  narrowly 
circumscribed. 

The  truth  is  that  the  individual  is  in  the  position 
of  the  primitive  tribe.  If  he  is  forced  to  give  all  his 
waking  hours  to  "getting  a  living,"  it  matters  little 
what  his  employment  is.  One  is  as  bad  as  another. 
And  if  by  his  work  he  wins  leisure,  all  depends  on 
the  use  of  that  leisure.  Spinoza  gained  his  bread 
by  grinding  optical  glasses, — surely  an  uninspiring 
mechanical  drudgery  !  But  in  odd  times  he  wrote 
his  Ethics,  than  which  no  nobler  contribution  to  the 
highest  realms  of  thought  has  ever  been  composed. 


CHAPTER  IV 

THE  INFLUENCE  OF  THE  GEOGRAPHIC  EN- 
VIRONMENT 

'T^HE  extent  to  which  the  geographic  environment 
'■•  decides  the  character  and  history  of  a  people 
has  been  and  still  is  a  question  on  which  competent 
writers  differ  widely. 

On  the  one  side  we  have  such  writers  as  Draper, 
Menschikoff,  von  Ihering,  Ratzel,  and  generally  the 
Russian  and  English  schools,  who  seek  in  climate, 
soil,  and  waterways  the  explanation  of  the  whole 
of  history.  Their  views  may  be  summed  up  in  the 
maxim  of  von  Ihering,  "  The  soil  is  the  Nation." 

In  contrast  to  them  stand  the  pure  psychologists, 
notably  the  French  school,  who  refuse  to  admit  any 
great  or  lasting  power  of  the  material  surroundings 
on  the  psychical  traits.  These,  they  claim,  are  to  be 
looked  for  in  race  and  in  permanent  anatomical 
differences,  persisting  in  all  climes  and  spots.  They 
would  say  with  the  philosopher  Hegel:  ''Tell  me 
not  of  the  inspiration  of  Ionian  skies  !     Have  they 

i8o 


GEOGRAPHIC  ENVIRONMENT  i8i 

not   for   a   thousand  years   spread   their   beauties   in 
vain  before  degenerate  eyes?" 

The  latter  party,  however,  by  no  means  insist  that 
the  environment  is  indifferent.  They  would  entirely 
agree  with  Professor  Wundt,  that  purely  psychologi- 
cal laws  are  inadequate  to  explain  the  events  of 
history,  and  that  we  must  constantly  take  into  ac- 
count the  associated  physical  conditions  in  order 
correctly  to  tell  the  story  of  human  development. 
They  would  not  deny  that  in  some  remote  and  in- 
visible past  the  racial  mind,  like  the  racial  anatomy, 
must  have  absorbed  its  permanent  characteristics 
from  local  impressions ;  but  this  once  accomplished, 
they  would  argue,  both  orders  of  characteristics  be- 
came ineffaceable. 

Even  the  most  determined  of  the  "  anthropo-geo- 
graphers "  will  not  deny  that  the  power  over  the 
mind  which  they  attribute  to  geographical  features 
diminishes  in  proportion  as  culture  increases,  to  the 
extent  that  it  is  no  lonsfer  coercive  in  civilised  life. 
Nor  can  anyone  who  reflects  be  blind  to  the  fact 
that  the  sameness  brought  about  by  subjection  to 
given  geographical  conditions  is  something  very  dif- 
ferent from  the  unity  produced  by  mental  association. 

The  decision  of  this  debated  question  presents  it- 
self to  me  in  a  light  which  I  have  not  seen  stated  by 
previous  writers. 


i82  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

Both  parties  are  right.  We  must  agree  with  Hegel 
that  the  most  lovely  and  advantageous  spots  on  earth 
fail  to  develop  their  inhabitants  ;  and  yet,  where  such 
development  takes  place,  we  can  always  point  to  the 
geographic  conditions  which  have  alone  rendered  it 
possible. 

In  reality,  the  question  is  one  only  Indirectly  of 
geography.  It  belongs,  directly,  in  quite  another  de- 
partment of  research,  that  of  Economics,  the  science 
of  the  production  and  distribution  of  material  wealth. 

No  matter  how  fertile  the  soil,  how  inviting  the 
waterways,  how  smiling  the  skies,  man  will  remain 
amid  it  all  the  savage  of  the  prime  unless  he  have 
within  him  the  psychical  stimulus  to  make  use  of 
these  for  the  increase  of  his  wealth  ;  and  that  stimulus 
comes  not  from  without. 

Material  wealth  is  as  much  a  condition  of  mental 
growth  as  is  bodily  nutrition,  but  is  just  as  far  as  is 
the  latter  from  being  either  a  synonym  or  a  measure 
of  such  growth.     It  is  a  prerequisite,  not  a  correlate. 

The  application  of  this  principle  explains  the  dis- 
crepant facts  which  have  led  to  the  conflict  of  opinions 
in  anthropo-geography.  Without  geographic  facilities, 
a  nation  cannot  become  wealthy  ;  and  without  wealth 
it  is  even  more  at  a  disadvantage  than  the  individual. 

Poverty  and  riches  are  what  most  influence  the 
fate  of  men  and  nations. 


V 


GEOGRAPHIC  ENVIRONMENT  183 


Armuth  ist  die  grosste  Plage, 
Reichthum  ist  das  hochste  Gut. 


Goethe. 


Life  Itself  is  a  question  not  merely  of  means,  but 
of  ample  means.  In  central  England  the  rich  have 
an  average  longevity  of  forty-nine  years,  the  poor 
but  twenty-five  years ;  in  Berlin  the  rich  live  fifty 
years,  and  the  poor  thirty-two  years  (Farr,  Kolb). 

The  higher  culture,  anything  above  the  mere  fight 
for  life,  can  find  a  place  only  when  it  is  possible, 
through  accumulated  wealth,  to  call  a  truce  in  that 
fight.  The  leisure  so  obtained  may  not  be,  generally 
is  not,  employed  to  that  higher  end  ;  but  without  it 
the  effort  remains  impossible. 

Anthropo  -  geography,  therefore,  is  primarily  a 
branch  of  economics,  not  of  ethnology.  It  affects 
the  ethnic  mind  only  indirectly,  and  not  at  all 
through  the  action  of  any  laws  of  its  own.  It  is  a 
vital  factor  in  the  production  of  tribal  or  national 
wealth,  but  in  no  way  influences  the  use  which  the 
tribe  or  nation  may  make  of  that  wealth  ;  while  this 
is  the  only  question  with  which  the  ethnologist  or 
the  historian  of  human  culture  is  primarily  concerned. 

With  this  perfectly  clear  understanding  on  the  real 
bearings  of  the  much-talked-of  "  geographic  environ- 
ment," I  shall  proceed  to  review  its  leading  divisions. 

Such  a  conclusion  will  not  be  favoured  by  those 


1 84  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

writers  who  teach  that  the  surroundlnofs  exert  in 
some  manner  an  inspiring  or  a  depressing  effect  on 
the  mind,  and  that  this  reflects  itself  in  the  ethnic 
character.  What !  they  will  exclaim  ;  are  we  to  count 
for  nothing  the  sweet  meads,  the  sparkling  waters, 
the  glory  of  the  landscape,  and  the  hues  of  the  flow- 
ers ?  The  grandeur  of  the  forest,  the  sublimity  of 
beetling  crags,  the  solemn  expanse  of  the  ocean,  — 
are  these  of  no  avail  in  impressing  the  souls  that^ 
see  them  with  exalted  aspirations  and  fervently 
stimulating  the   imagination  ? — 

Alas  !  '*  The  hand  of  little  use  has  the  daintier 
touch,"  and  lifelong  familiarity  with  the  most  beauti- 
ful scenes  of  nature  reduces  to  zero  the  stimulus 
which  they  are  capable  of  yielding  to  others. 

Wordsworth  held  the  other  view  and  could  sing  : 

The  thought  of  death  sits  easy  on  the  man 

Who  has  been  born  and  dies  among  the  mountains. 

But  it  is  obvious,  on  reading  the  note  in  which  he 
explains  the  source  of  his  observation,  that  it  was 
their  social  culture,  not  their  local  habitation,  which 
imparted  this  seeming  indifference  to  the  peasantry. 
Precisely  the  same  indifference  to  death  among  their 
congeners  in  France  was  noted  long  before  by 
Montaigne. 

There  are  three  chief  economic  factors,  derived 
from    geographic    surroundings,    which    decide    the 


GEOGRAPHIC  ENVIRONMENT  185 

material  welfare  of  a  human   group  on  any  part  of 
the  earth's   surface.     They  are  : 

I. — The  distribution  of  the  surface  land  and  water. 

2. — The  character  of  the  soil  with  reference  to 
productiveness,  in  the  mineral,  floral,  and  faunal 
realms. 

3. — Its  salubrity  for  man. 
These  favour  or  oppose  the  three  essential  desiderata 
for  human  progress,  to  wit : 

I. —  Intercommunication. 

2. — Abundant  nutrition  and  materials  for  the  arts. 

3. — Bodily  health. 

The  Distribution  of  Land  and  Water. — The 
Iroquois  Indians  call  the  peace-belt  of  wampum 
which  is  exchanged  between  friendly  tribes  a  "river," 
because  it  unites,  as  does  some  smooth  watercourse, 
those  living  apart.  This  is  a  sweet  native  tribute  to 
the  influence  of  navigable  streams  in  bringing  man 
into  relation  to  man.  Bays,  fiords,  and  harbours  per- 
mitted man  with  frail  early  craft  to  keep  along  the 
seashore  for  thousands  of  miles.  Thus  the  Tupis 
migrated  from  the  river  La  Plata  to  beyond  the 
mouth  of  the  Amazon  and  far  up  that  stream  ;  while, 
antedating  history,  the  Mediterranean  peoples  dared 
the  stormy  Iberian  coast  to  visit  the  remote  Cas- 
siterides  and  the  boreal   isles   of  Thule. 

The  Delaware  Indians  expressed  their  relationship 


t86  ethnic  psychology 

among  themselves  by  saying,  "  We  drink  the  same 
water,"  meaning  that  they  all  dwelt  on  the  Delaware 
River  and  its  tributaries.  Thus  watersheds,  through 
the  facility  of  intercourse  they  offered,  became 
natural  national  areas,  and  developed  unity  of 
thought    and    feeling. 

Lake-districts  exerted  a  like  influence  and  became 
not  only  strongholds  by  their  pile  dwellings,  but 
centres  of  tribal  unity.  When  Cortes  reached  the 
valley  of  Mexico  he  found  the  shores  of  the  lake 
occupied  by  three  nations,  independent  but  closely 
federated  for  offence  and  defence. 

These  are  examples  of  the  unifying  powers  of  the 
watery  elements ;  but  in  its  might  as  a  torrental 
stream  or  as  *'the  unplumbed,  salt,  estranging  sea,"  it 
severs  the  families  of  men  with  a  no  less  stringent 
potency.  No  more  striking  example  can  be  offered 
than  that  of  the  American  race,  the  so-called  "In- 
dians "  of  our  continent.  They  extended  over  the 
whole  area  from  the  austral  to  the  boreal  oceans, 
a  race-unit,  identical  in  anatomical  traits,  but  absol- 
utely isolated  from  the  rest  of  mankind,  not  a  trace 
of  European,  Asiatic,  or  Polynesian  influence  in  their 
languages  or  cultures. 

The  land  areas  offer  obstacles  more  frequently 
than  facilities  to  tribal  intercommunication.  Mount- 
ain chains,  deserts,  steppes,  vast  swamps,  dense  for- 


GEOGRAPHIC  ENVIRONMENT  187 

ests,  and  tangled  jungles  isolated  by  formidable 
barriers  the  early  hordes,  leaving  them  to  battle 
singly  with  the  difficulties  of  existence.  The  Roman 
writers  say  that  interpreters  for  seventy  different 
languages  were  needed  in  the  Caucasus,  and  de  Leon 
pretends  that  in  the  mountains  of  Ecuador  there 
were  as  many  tongues  as  there  were  villages.  That 
Egyptian  and  Babylonian  civilisation  flourished  con- 
temporaneously for  five  thousand  years  without  either 
colouring  the  other  is  explained  by  the  trackless  and 
arid  desert  which  lay  between  them. 

Differences  in  mere  area,  a  matter  of  square  miles, 
materially  modify  the  ethnic  mind.  Great  men  are 
not  born  in  small  islands.  The  less  the  area  of  a 
state,  the  less  the  variety  of  its  life,  the  fewer  the 
stimuli  to  thought  and  emotion,  the  narrower  the 
range  of  observation.  The  ethnographer  Gerland 
attributes  the  mental  degeneracy  of  the  Polynesians, 
compared  to  their  cognates,  the  Malays,  directly  to 
the  much  smaller  islands  which  they  were  obliged  to 
inhabit. 

Mere  jmrnber  acts  in  a  similar  manner  on  the 
psyche.  A  nation  of  many  millions  has  greater  self- 
confidence  ;  each  citizen  feels  its  power  strengthening 
his  own  courage,  his  faith  is  firmer  in  what  so  many 
believe,  and  he  is  the  readier  to  labour  for  aims  which 
so  many  admire. 


1 88  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

The  relation  of  the  area  to  the  number  yields  the 
derisity  of  the  population,  which,  with  its  collateral 
condition  of  distribiction,  is  a  ruling  factor  in  ethnic 
life. 

I  have  placed  the  geographic  features  which  favour 
or  impede  intercommunication  first  on  the  list  of 
those  which  modify  the  ethnic  mind  ;  and  design- 
edly so. 

In  the  philosophic  study  of  human  development 
the  social  and  antisocial  factors  demand  our  first 
attention.  A  man  becomes  man  only  as  one  of  many. 
Nothing  so  lames  progress  as  isolation  ;  nothing  so 
hastens  it  as  good  company  ;  and  I  am  fain  to  en- 
dorse the  proverb  that  bad  company  is  better  than 
none.  Rapid  transportation  is  the  key  to  the 
phenomenal  growth  of  the  nineteenth  century  :  trans- 
portation of  weight  by  steam,  of  thought  by  elec- 
tricity. The  Romans  knew  the  value  of  good  roads 
and  made  the  best  which  have  ever  been  constructed  ; 
the  Phoenicians  and  Greeks  won  their  pre-eminence, 
not  by  ]the  resources  of  their  home  provinces,  but  by 
their  skill  as  sailors. 

The  Soil. — Next  and  second  in  deciding  the  history 
and  character  of  a  people  comes  the  nature  of  the 
soil,  the  earth,  on  which  they  live. 

Lts  value  is  to  them  in  what  it  yields,  either  spon- 
taneously or  by  labour.     The  primitive  man  contented 


I 


GEOGRAPHIC  ENVIRONMENT  189 

himself  with  the  former ;  but  culture  came  along 
when  toil  entered.  For  culture  ever  demands  an 
effort  greater  than  that  immediately  necessary  for 
existence,  because  its  aim,  from  first  to  last,  is  di- 
rected to  the  future  ;  and  the  higher  the  culture,  the 
more  distant  is  that  future. 

Even  the  earliest  men  levied  tribute  on  all  the 
realms  of  nature.  The  cave-dwellers  of  the  Gironde 
caught  fishes  and  trapped  beasts  ;  they  gathered  nuts 
and  edible  roots  ;  and  they  sought  diligently  for  the 
stones  best  adapted  to  lance-points  and  scrapers.  All 
this  we  know  from  the  remains  left  in  their  rock- 
shelters.  They  utilised  the  soil  to  the  full  extent  of 
their  knowledo^e  and  wants. 

The  wealth  they  thus  amassed  was  scanty  and 
transitory  ;  but  when  their  successors,  the  neolithic 
peoples,  appeared  with  domesticated  animals,  an 
agriculture,  a  beginning  of  sedentary  life  and  city 
building,  and,  ere  long,  devised  the  excavation  of 
ores  wherewith  to  fashion  weapons  of  bronze,  the 
land-areas  suitable  for  these  occupations  soon  became 
the  centres  of  ethnic  life  and  property. 

I  need  not  pursue  the  story  of  the  growth  of  these 
prime  industries :  the  cultivation  of  the  soil,  the 
domestication  of  animals,  the  exploitation  of  mines, 
the  transformation  from  a  wandering  to  a  sedentary 
life,  from  vagabondage  to  the  hallowed  associations 


I90  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

of   a    home,    and    the    effects   which    these   changes 
wrought  on  the  sentiments  and  intellects  of  tribes. 

What  I  wish  particularly  to  point  out  is  that  what 
man  asks  from  the  soil  is  primarily  nutrition, — only 
nutrition,  a  living.  It  is  the  "food-quest"  which  has 
been  so  vividly  portrayed  in  American  primitive  life 
by  Mindeleff  and  so  fully  set  forth  by  Mason  :  the 
tribe  enslaved  by  the  soil  ;  its  laws,  religion,  customs, 
hopes,  and  fears  wrapped  up  and  submerged  in  the 
desperate  strife  for  food.  Only  where  there  is  a  sur- 
plus, where  wealth  rises  above  want,  is  it  possible  for" 
the  group  to  free  itself  from  this  bondage  to  the  clod, 
— to  become  more  than  an  "adscript  of  the  glebe." 

The  relations  between  man  and  the  fauna  and 
flora  of  the  region  he  inhabits  are  constant  and  in- 
timate. The  progress  of  civilisation  has  been  traced 
by  Pickering  and  others  in  the  distribution  of  plants 
cultivated  by  man  for  his  food,  use,  or  pleasure.  They 
have  been  rightly  named  by  Gerland  "  the  levers  of 
his  elevation."  Especially  the  cereals  supplied  him  a 
regular,  appropriate,  and  sufficient  nutrition.  Their 
product  was  not  perishable,  like  fruit,  but  could  be 
stored  against  the  season  of  cold  and  want.  Their 
cultivation  led  to  a  sedentary  life,  to  the  clearing  and 
tillage  of  the  soil,  to  its  irrigation,  and  to  the  study  of 
the  seasons  and  their  chancres. 

o 

The  grain,  once  harvested,  still  required  prepara- 


GEOGRAPHIC  ENVIRONMENT  191 

tion  to  become  an  acceptable  article  of  food.  It 
must  be  soaked  or  crushed  and  in  some  way  cooked. 
These  processes  stimulated  inventive  ingenuity,  en- 
couraged regular  labour,  and  required  specialisation 
of  employment. 

In  the  huntincr  and  fishinor  stao^e  of  culture  the 
fauna  supplies  the  chief  articles  of  food.  To  obtain 
it  was  man's  earliest  school  of  thought.  He  had  to 
surpass  the  deer  in  swiftness  and  the  lion  in  strength, 
or  devise  means  to  circumvent  them.  We  find  the 
early  cave-men  had  accomplished  as  much.  They 
prepared  pitfalls  for  the  mammoth,  traps  for  the 
sabre-toothed  tiger,  foils  for  the  fleet  reindeer,  and 
did  not  hesitate  to  encounter  even  the  formidable 
rhinoceros.  Nets,  hooks,  and  fishing-gear  were 
thought  out  with  which  to  lure  and  ensnare  the  deni- 
zens of  the  streams. 

But  a  far  more  rapid  advance  in  his  culture  condi- 
tion came  about  when  man  bent  his  energies  to  the 
preservation,  not  to  the  destruction,  of  the  lower 
animals.  By  the  process  of  domestication  he  secured 
not  only  an  abundant  supply  of  food  in  their  milk  and 
flesh,  but  beasts  of  burden  and  draught,  facilitating 
rapid  intercourse  and  enabling  him  to  conquer  more 
rapidly  the  nature  around  him. 

The  mental  growth  of  many  peoples  has  been  in- 
separably linked  to  a  single  animal.    Thus  the  Tartars 


192  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

of  the  steppes  have  their  horses,  the  Todas  their 
cows,  the  Tuaregs  their  camels,  without  which  their 
social  organisations  would  be  wholly  lost. 

The  absence  in  America  of  any  indigenous  animal 
suited  for  burden  or  draught  which  could  be  domestic- 
ated was  one  of  the  fatal  flaws  in  the  ancient  culture 
of  the  continent,  drawing  a  line  beyond  which  pro- 
gress in  many  directions  became  impossible. 

Salubrity. — By  salubrity  I  mean  the  general  tend- 
ency of  a  locality  to  maintain  the  normal  functions- 
of  the  body. 

This  depends  chiefly  on  what  is  included  in  the 
term  *' climate,"  for  soils  become  unhealthy  only 
through  the  action  of  climatic  conditions.  These 
may  be  classed  under  three  headings  : 

1.  Temperature,  which  considers  both  the  actual 
amount  of  heat  and  also  the  rapidity  or  extent  of  its 
variations  (the  "range"). 

2.  Moisture,  including  rain-  and  snow-fall  and  the 
average  humidity. 

3.  Variety,  not  merely  in  the  two  conditions  above 
mentioned,  but  of  seasons,  winds,  clouds,  electricity, 
etc. 

The  last-mentioned  has  been  too  frequently  over- 
looked or  underrated  by  medical  and  ethnographic 
geographers.  In  reality,  it  is  the  most  potent  of  the 
three  in  its  results  on  the  human  body  and  mind.      It 


GEOGRAPHIC  ENVIRONMENT  193 

is  easy  to  show  that  it  is  not  the  extreme  of  heat  or 
cold  which  acts  injuriously  on  the  system,  but  the  con- 
tinuance of  the  temperature.  A  climate  with  a  marked 
seasonal  contrast  between  summer  and  winter  is  con- 
fessedly more  invigorating  than  one,  no  matter  how 
delightful,  which  is  practically  the  same  from  year- 
end  to  year-end. 

To  keep  in  health,  to  maintain  the  functions  in 
their  highest  relative  activity,  is  the  condition  of  the 
most  effective  work.  Neither  the  individual  nor  the 
ethnic  mind  can  reach  its  best  results  unless  the  body 
is  in  a  healthful  condition.  Hence,  those  localities 
which  are  prone  to  endemic  diseases  or  to  frequent 
epidemics  can  never  maintain  a  population  intellect- 
ually equal  to  spots  more  favoured  in  this  respect. 

The  most  marked  and  widespread  of  the  endemic 
poisons  is  malaria,  the  result  of  a  paludal  germ  which 
has  not  yet  been  isolated.  Heat  and  moisture  are  re- 
quisite to  its  development,  and  immunity  from  it  is 
unknown  in  any  race. 

Malaria  is  the  curse  of  plains  and  lowlands,  while 
mountainous  regions  have  almost  the  monopoly  of 
croitre  and  cretinism.  These  endemic  maladies  di- 
rectly  diminish  the  mental  powers  through  disturbing 
the  circulation  of  the  brain.  They  contribute  largely 
to  the  inferior  intellectual  status  of  mountaineers, 
already  prepared  by  the  isolation  of  their  lives. 


194  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

The  most  Important  ethnic  question  In  connection 
with  cHmate  Is  that  of  the  possIblHty  of  a  race  adapt- 
ing Itself  to  cHmatIc  conditions  widely  different  from 
those  to  which  It  has  been  accustomed.  This  is  the 
question  of  Acclimatisation. 

Its  bearings  on  ethnic  psychology  can  be  made  at 
once  evident  by  posing  a  few  practical  inquiries  :  Can 
the  English  people  flourish  in  India?  Will  the  French 
colonise  successfully  the  Sudan  ?  Have  the  Euro- 
peans lost  or  gained  in  power  by  their  migration  to 
the  United  States  ?  Can  the  white  or  any  other  race 
ultimately  become  the  sole  residents  of  the  globe  ? 

It  will  be  seen  that  on  the  answers  to  such  ques- 
tions depends  the  destiny  of  races  and  the  conse- 
quences to  the  species  of  the  facilities  of  transportation 
offered  by  modern  inventions.  The  subject  has  there- 
fore received  the  careful  study  of  medical  geographers 
and  statisticians. 

I  can  give  but  a  brief  statement  of  their  conclusions. 
They  are  to  the  effect,  first,  that  when  the  migration 
takes  place  along  approximately  the  same  isothermal 
lines,  the  changes  In  the  system  are  slight ;  but  as  the 
mean  annual  temperature  rises,  the  body  becomes 
increasingly  unable  to  resist  its  deleterious  action  until 
a  difference  of  i8°  F.  is  reached,  at  which  continued 
existence  of  the  more  northern  race  becomes  impos- 
sible. 


GEOGRAPHIC  ENVIRONMENT  195 

They  suffer  from  a  chemical  chan<^e  in  the  condition 
of  the  bloocPcells,  leading  to  anaemia  in  the  individual 
and  to  extinction  of  the  lineage  in  the  third  genera- 


'I'his  is  the  general  law  of  the  relation  to  race  and 
climate.  Like  most  laws,  it  has  its  exceptions,  de- 
pending on  special  conditions.  A^  stock  which  has_ 
long  been  accustomed  to  change  ot  climate  adapts 
itself  to  any  with  greater  facility.  This  explains  the 
singular  readiness  of  the  Jews  to  settle  and  flourish  in 


^^ 


all  zones.  For  a  similar  reason  a  people  who  at  horhe 
are  accustomed  to  a  climate  of  wide  and  sudden 
changes,  like  that  of  the  eastern  United  States,  sup- 
ports others  with  less  loss  of  power  than  the  average. 

A  locality  may  be  extremely  hot,  but  unusually  free 
from  other  malefic  influences,  being  dry,  with  regular 
and  moderate  winds,  and  well  drained,  such  as  certain 
areas  between  the  Red  Sea  and  the  Nile,  which  are 
also  quite  salubrious. 

Finally,  certain  individuals  and  certain  families, 
owing  to  some  fortunate  power  of  resistance  which 
we  cannot  explain,  acclimate  successfully  where  their 
companions  perish.  Most  of  the  instances  of  alleged 
successful  acclimatisation  of  Europeans  in  the  tropics 
are  due  to  such  exceptions,  the  far  greater  number  of 
the  victims  bein^r  left  out  of  the  count. 

If   these  alleo:ed   successful    cases,   or  that   of   the 


196  ETHNIC  PSYCHOLOGY 

Jews  or  Arabs,  be  closely  examined,  it  will  almost 
surely  be  discovered  that  another  physiological  ele- 
ment has  been  active  in  brins^inor  about  acclimatisa- 
tion,  and  that  is  the  mingling  of  blood  with  the 
native  race.  In  the  American  tropics  the  Spaniards 
have  survived  for  four  centuries  ;  but  how  many  of 
the  Ladinos  can  truthfully  claim  an  unmixed  descent  ? 
In  Guatemala,  for  example,  says  a  close  observer,  not 
any.  The  Jews  of  the  Malabar  coast  have  actually  be- 
come  black,  and  so  has  also  in  Africa  many  an  Arab 
claiming  Hirert  descent  from  the  Prophet  himself. 

,  But  along  with  this  process  of  adaptation  by 
amalgamation  comes  unquestionably  a  lowering  of 
the  mental  vitality  of  the  higher  race.  That  is  the 
price  it  has_to  pay  for  the  privilege  of  survival  under 
the  new  conditions.      But,  in  conformity  to  the  prin- 


ciples already  laid  down  as  accepted  by  all  anthro- 
pologists, such  a  lowering  must  correspond  to  a 
degeneration  in  the  highe^tg-rades  of  structure,  the 
brain-cells. 


We   are   forced,   therefore,    to   reach   the   decision 


that  the  human  species  attains  Its  highest  develop- 
HTui'il  only  under  moderate  conditions  of  heat,  such 
a's  prevail  in  the  temperate  zones  (an  annual  mean 
of  8°-i2°  C.)  ;  and  the  more  startling  conclusion 
that  the  races  now  native  to  the  polar  and  tropical 
areas    are    distinctly  pathological,    are   types    of    de- 


GEOGRAPHIC  ENVIRONMENT  197 

generacy,  having  forfeited  their  highest  physiological 
^"elemeTitsrrn  order  to  ^ybrchase  immunity  from  the  un- 
favonrable  climntir.  conditions  to  which  they  are  sub- 
jectr"We  must  agree  with  a  French  writer,  that  "  man 
is  not  cosmopolitan,"  ancl  if  he  insists  on  becoming  a 
"  citizen  of  the  world  he  is  taxed  heavily  in  his  best 
estate  for  his  presumption. 

The  inferences  in  racial  psychology  which  follow 
this  opinion  are  too  evident  to  require  detailed  men- 
tion.^T^atural  selection  has  fitted  the  Eskimo  and 
the  Sudanese  for  their  respective  abodes,  but  it  has 
been  by  the  process  of  regressive  evolution  ;  pro- 
gressive evolution  in  man  has  confined  itself  to  less 
extreme  climatic  areas. 

The  facts  of  acclimatisation  stand  in  close  con- 
nection with  another  doctrine  in  anthropology  which 
is  interesting  for  my  theme,  that  of  "  ethno-geographic 
provinces."  Alexander  von  Humboldt  seems  to 
have  been  the  first  to  give  expression  to  this  system 
of  human  grouping,  and  it  has  been  diligently  cult- 
ivated by  his  disciple,  Professor  Bastian. 

It  rests  upon  the  application  to  the  human  spe- 
cies of  two  general  principles  recognised  as  true  in 
zoology  and  botany.  The  one  is,  that  ever)^  organ- 
ism is  directly  dependent  on  its  environment  (the 
milieii),  action  and  reaction  going  on  constantly 
between  them ;   the  other  is,  that  no  two  faunal  or 


198  E^THNJC  PSYCHOLOGY 

floral  regions  are  of  equal  rank  in  their  capacity  for 
the  development  of  a  given  type  of  organism. 

The  features  which  distinguish  one  ethno-geo- 
graphic  province  from  another  are  chiefly,  accord- 
ing to  Bastian,  meteorological,  and  they  permit,  he 
claims,  a  much  closer  division  of  human  groups  than 
the  creneral  continental  areas  which  orive  us  an  Af- 

o  o 

rican,  a  European,  and  an  American  subspecies. 

It  is  possible  that  more  extended  researches  may 
enable  ethnographers  to  map  out,  in  this  sense,  the 
distribution  of  our  species  ;  but  the  secular  altera- 
tions in  meteorologic  conditions,  combined  with  the 
migratory  habits  of  most  early  communities,  must 
greatly  interfere  with  a  rigid  application  of  these 
principles  in  ethnography. 

The  historic  theory  of  "  centres  of  civilisation  "  is 
allied  to  that  of  ethno-geographic  provinces.  The 
stock  examples  of  such  are  familiar.  The  Babylon- 
ian plain,  the  valley  of  the  Nile,  in  America  the 
plateaux  of  Mexico  and  of  TIahuanuco  are  constantly 
quoted  as  such.  The  geographic  advantages  these 
situations  offered, — a  fertile  soil,  protection  from  ene- 
mies, domesticable  plants,  and  a  moderate  climate, — 
are  offered  as  reasons  why  an  advanced  culture 
rapidly  developed  in  them,  and  from  them  extended 
over  adjacent  regions. 

Without  denying  the  advantages  of  such  surround- 


GEOGRAPHIC  ENVIRONMENT  199 

ings,  the  most  recent  researches  in  both  hemispheres 
tend  to  reduce  materially  their  influence.  The  cult- 
ures in  question  did  not  begin  at  one  point  and 
radiate  from  it,  but  arose  simultaneously  over  wide 
areas,  in  different  linguistic  stocks,  with  slight  con- 
nections ;  and  only  later,  and  secondarily,  was  it  suc- 
cessfully concentrated  by  some  one  tribe, — by  the 
agency,  it  is  now  believed,  of  cognatic  rather  than 
geographic  aids. 

Assyriologists  no  longer  believe  that  Sumerian 
culture  originated  in  the  delta  of  the  Euphrates,  and 
Egyptologists  look  for  the  sources  of  the  civilisation 
of  the  Nile  valley  among  the  Libyans  ;  while  in  the 
New  World  not  one,  but  seven  stocks  partook  of  the 
Aztec  learning,  and  half  a  dozen  contributed  to  that 
of  the  Incas.  The  prehistoric  culture  of  Europe 
was  not  one  of  Carthaginians  or  Phoenicians,  but  was 
self-developed. 


INDEX 


Acclimatisation,  194 

Adaptability,  58 

African,  27,  79,  89,  133,  134,  136,  138 

Alcoholism,  99 

American  Indian,   70,   142,  153,  159, 

162 
Ammon,  87,  128 
Annamite,  132 
Arab,  99,  102,  196 
Aristotle,  15 
Arizona,  134 
Aryan,  130,  161,  166 
Asia  Minor,  117 
Assyria,  156 
Asthenia,  117 
Atavism,  151 
Australian,    52,    105,    136,    137,    142, 

159,  16S,  174 
Aztec,  71,  199 

Bache,  132 

Baker,  152 

Baldwin,  75 

Bastian,  15,  153,  15S,  197,  198 

Berendt,  145 

Black  Death,  102,  162 

Blackstone,  169 

Boas,  153 

Boole,  14 

Bowditch,  152 

Brachycephaly,  129 

Brain,  126 


Brazilian,  24,  loS 
Broca,  153 
Browning,  Mrs.,  66 
Buckle,  87,  158 
Buschan,  160 
Bushmen,  88,  134,  135 
Byron,  138,  144 

Cakchiquel,  145 

Capitan,  83 

Castren,  113 

Cattell,  132 

Caucasus,  187 

Centralisation,  39 

Chauvinism,  115 

China,  68,  79,  137,  176 

Chippeway,  52 

Climate,  192 

Collignon,  87,  135,  150 

Comparative  psychology,  3^. 

Cope,  10 

Cortes,  186 

Cousin,  xvi 

Criminality,  106 

Crusades,  93,  log 

Cuba,  116 

Darwin,  140,  148 
Delusions,  108 
Destructive  impulse,  115 
Divorce,  94 
Dolichocephaly,  129 


201 


202 


INDEX 


Dominant  ideas,  no 
Draper,  i8o 
Dreams,  io8 
Dumont,  98 

Economics,  1S2 

Education,  53 

Ellis,  94,  141 

Emerson,  ix 

Erotomania,  114 

Eskimo,  89,  118,  132,  145 

Ethnic  ideas,  21 

—  psychology,  defined,  vii^. 

a  natural  science,  xii 

Exaltation,  113 
Ezzelino  da  Romano,  115 

Faculties,  disuse  of,  68 

Farr,  183 

Feminism,   140 

Fere,  87 

Ferrero,   114 

Folk,  33 

Folk-lore,  51 

Forethought,  61 

Fouillee,  131 

Fuegian,  18,  34,  127,  132 

Galton,  91,  92 
Gambetta,  127 
Gerland,  77,  187,  190 
Gobineau,  153 
Goethe,  55,  138,  17S 
Goitre,  loi 

Group,  defined,  33,  42 
Guaranis,  113 

Haeckel,  132 
Hale,  105 
Haliburton,  134 
Hegel,  180,  1 82 
Height,  134 
Heredity,  147 


Herve,  133,  140,  153 
Homesickness,  117 
Hovelacque,  153 
Humboldt,  von,  A.,  89,  197 

—  VV.,  28 
Hurons,  112 
Hybridity,  152 
Hypersthenia,  H2 
Hysteria,  112 

Iconoclasm,  116 

Ideal,  The,  9 

Ideas,  elementary,  20 

—  ethnic,  21 
Ideation,  4 
Ihering,  von,  180 
lies,  80 
Imagination,  8 
Imbecility,  105 
Incas,  199 

India,  70,  109,  176 

Individual    and    Group,    contrasted, 

23  #. 
Indo-Chinese,  140 
Indo-European,  166 
Indonesian,  133 
Industry,  54 
Infanticide,  137 
Instinct,  ^  ff. 
Intellectual  Deficiency,  104 

—  Process,  13 
Intelligence  6 
Inventiveness,  56 
Ireland,  S3 
Iroquois,  185 

Jacoby,  151 

Japanese,  133 

Jesuits,  112 

Jevons,  13 

Jews,  102,  161,  195,  196 

Jingoism,  115 

Johnson,  89 


INDEX 


20 


Kamchatkan,  108,  132 
Kant,  143 
Klemm,  55 
Kohlbriigge,  152 
Kolb,  183 
Krafft-Ebing,  94 
Krejci,  23 

Lamarck,  14S 

Land  and  Water,  distribution  of,  185 

Language,  18,  164 

Lapouge,  99,  iii,  128,  130 

Lapps,  118,  134 

Law,  167 

Laycock,  119 

Lazarus,  vii 

Lenguas,  162 

Leon,  de,  187 

Letourneau,  ix,  61,  159 

Libyans,  199 

Licentiousness,  94 

Lichtenstein,  14 

Liebig,  127 

Livi,  131 

Locke,  4 

Lombroso,  131 

Lykanthropy,  109 

Malaria,  100,  193 
Malay,  12,  112,  113,  187 
Mai  thus,  139 
Mania,  epidemic,  109 
Manouvrier,  143 
Marriage,  iioff. 

—  abstention  from,  92 

—  premature  and  delayed,  91 
Mason,  190 

Mayas.  71,  92.  131 
Melancholia,  117 
Menschikoff,  180 
Mental  Shock,  102 
Mexicans,  99,  18O 
Mill,  124 


Mind,  human  and    brute,  compared, 

—  mechanical  action  of,  14 

—  unity  of,  2jf- 

—  of  the  Group,  23^. 

not  creative,  30 

Mindeleff,  190 
Modes  of  Progress,  72 
Mohammedan,  ill 
Moisture,  192 
Montaigne,  184 
Morgan,  80 
Mortillet,  de,  77 

M  tiller,  136 
Muscular  System,  134 

Napoleon,  44 

Natality,  diminution  of,  0 

Nation,  33 

Nervous  System,  132 

Neurasthenia,  118 

Nippur,  76 

Normans,  151 

Northmen,  161 

Nostalgia,  117 

Nott,  153 

Nutrition,  190 

—  imperfect,  87 

Occupation,  173 
Orgeas,  157,  160 
Osseous  System,  133 

Pascal,  5,  83 

Pathology,  159 

Permanence,  39 

Personality,  11 

Peruvian,  52,  71,  99,  134 

Perversion,  conditions  of,  107 

Pickering,  190 

Plato,  24,  53 

Polynesian,  1 14,  159,  162,  174,  187 

Post,  II 


204 


INDEX 


Progression,  arithmetical,  7S 

—  geometrical,  80 

—  saltatory,  80 
Progress,  rate  of,  77 
Psychic  Cells,  16 

Quakers,  6g 
Quatrefages,  de,  153 
Quechuas,  92,  131 
Quen,  de,  112 
Quetelet,  14,  40,  107 

Rabelais,  144 
Race,  33 
Ranke,  87 
Ratzel,  160,  180 
Receptiveness,  59 
Reibmayr,  155,  156 
Remembrance,  52 
Reproduction,  135 
Ribot,  143 
Romanes,  5 
Rousseau,  72 

Salubrity,  192 

Schaffhausen,  123 

Schmidt,  76 

Seeland,  145 

Self-consciousness,  10 

Semites,  102 

Sexual  subversions,  90 

Siam,  69 

Siberians,  99,  113 

Skull  measurements,  I2S_^. 

Soil,  188 

Soul,  \t>  ff. 

Spinoza,  179 

Steinthal,  vii,  178 


Stock,  33 
Symonds,  115 
Syphilis,  loi 

Tartar,  89,  191 
Tasmanian,  159 
Temperament,  143 
Temperature,  192 
Tibet,  92 
Tiedemann,  127 
Todas,  192 
Toxic  agents,  98 
Tribe,  33 
Tuaregs,  192 
Tupis,  1S5 

Van  Brero,  12 
Van  Buren,  136 
Variation,  physiological,  46 

—  progressive,  49 

—  regressive,  64 

—  modes  and  rates  of,  72 

—  parallel  and  divergent,  73 

—  in  circles  and  curves,  75 

—  in  waves,  77 

—  pathological,  82 

etiology  of,  85 

Vierkandt,  23,  56 
Vikings,  67 
Virchovv,  83 

Vital  Powers,  142 

Waitz,  158 
Weight,  134 
Wordsworth,  184 

Wundt,  viii,  ix,  xi,  xiii,  26,   28,    143, 
181 


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